The Toon Files Season 8
by Brekclub85
Summary: When the Toon Detective Complex crew try to build a portal to the real world, a chaotic series of events thrusts them (and the TGWTG crew) into something bigger then they've dealt with before. Part 2 of a trilogy of seasons.
1. The Book Worm Burrows

**The Toon Files Episode 92: The Book Worm Burrows.**

There's one thing that all people in our world share. Sure, everyone's different. No two people are exactly the same, but there's one thing we all have in common regardless of our differences.

And that thing is we exist in the same world. Indeed, plenty of people have different ideas on how this world should be ran, but we all exist in the real world. In the real world, we know what is real and what is fantasy. In this world, all of the other worlds you've read about in the past are just shows, movies, and video games.

However, some toons were seeking to end this separation.

…

It had been several months since the terrorist attack on the Toon Detective Complex, and most of the damage had been repaired. Better barriers were established to the core of the worlds.

Some of the original members had decided to leave, however. Dagnino and Kairel stayed in their world once Xiro relinquished the title so he could have more time to be with...his lady friend. The muscular tiger eagerly took the title. Seth left because he found a job that offered more money. Ulrich and Yumi decided to leave out of their sadness for Jeremie's death. Jaden decided to focus on his dueling skills.

After Jeremie's murder, Jimmy Kudo (who had been restored to his teenage body) was appointed head of the TDC, with Francis, his former rival and now good friend, as essentially the vice-president.

"So is the project ready Double D?" Jimmy asked one of the base's scientists.

"Indeed it is," Double D nodded, "With Twilight and Mantis's help, we've been able to invent pods that create a gateway to the real world. It'll be my most significant invention ever!"

"So when will this be demonstrated?" Abigail asked, testing out smaller battle armor Rarity had designed.

"This Friday," Mantis replied, "We rented out the Toon Town City Hall for the event."

"Better send out any invitations you'd like to give," Francis smiled.

"Good thinking," the Baron smiled to his fellow feline, "There's one particular person I feel should be witness to this."

"Who is that?" Dawn and Coco asked, the two friends having been promoted to detectives since the incident.

"Oh, a young writer," the Baron smiled, and with a little bit of magic, warped out of the current world the TDC was in.

…..

**Tokyo, Japan, 1995.**

Sometimes, the greatest adventures are the ones that remain in the imagination. This is something Shizuku Tsukishima used to help in her writing. The now high school student was confident in her dreams of becoming a writer, after having finished her first story about a cat figurine named the Baron.

She was in a relationship with her classmate Seiji Amasawa, whose goal in life was to become a great violin maker. He was also talented with the instrument itself. Seiji lived with his grandfather, who ran an antiques shop.

Today, Shizuku was at the local library, researching myths and history for inspiration for her next story.

"Let's see…..tanuki, I dunno if I can add my own spin to that," she said, looking through a book on the mythical form of raccoons.

Shizuku's friend Yuko Harada was also on the library, she had promised to pick up some books for her friends, namely Sugimura, her crush.

Seiji and Sugimura were at the antique shop, helping Seiji's grandfather with some modifications that were being made to the building.

"Hey Yuko," Shizuku waved to her friend. Yuko waved back, but she was focused on finding the right books.

"Hi," Yuko replied quickly.

…..

Everything seemed normal as Shizuku went to go check out the books she had selected. But the usual silence in the library was soon shattered.

"WHOA!" several teens exclaimed, jumping out of the way of falling shelves. Shizuku watched in shock as the history, science, and comedy book shelves tumbled, the various pieces of literature spilling out in several directions.

When the dust cleared, everyone looked on in shock.

"What the heck happened?!" Shizuku exclaimed, running over to Yuko.

"I don't know," Yuko replied, beginning to somewhat hyperventilate, "I was just picking out some books, and then I heard them all fall."

Shizuku looked around at the damage that had been done. Luckily, no walls in the library were damaged, but several of the books were torn up in the collapse.

"Dang it," the high schooler frowned, "I thought I could get some really useful info here."

"This can't be right," the Seiya Tsukishima, the librarian and Shizuku's father said, inspecting the damage.

"What do you mean, Mr. Tsukishima?" Yuko asked.

"I was looking at these shelves seconds before they fell," he replied, "No one was standing in between them. And I know these shelves are sturdy. How could they have possibly toppled over?"

Shizuku looked at the scene again and realized her father had a good point.

"You're right dad," she nodded, "This couldn't have been a simply accident. I think someone pulled off this dumb stunt right here in the library!"

"But how is the big question…." Yuko spoke up.

"I'll go call the janitor and for a repair crew," Mr. Tsukishima said, "Shizuku, tell your mother I'll probably be later than usual because of this mess….."

"Actually," Shizuku replied, "I'm not leaving just yet. I want to get to the bottom of this."

…..

The book worm began to look for clues amongst the piles of literature that had spread across the floor.

"Did you see anything odd Yuko?" Shizuku asked her friend.

"Not that I can recall," Yuko replied, "Sugimura asked me to pick up a sports journal he was wanting to look at, so I headed to get that right after I got here."

"Did you see anyone acting shady?" Shizuku questioned.

"No, not at all," Yuko explained, "I went to pick up the journal, and right after I did, that's when I heard the rumbling of the shelves falling."

"Ok," Shizuku nodded, going to look for clues. For the most part, besides her father and Yuko, the young writer didn't recognize anybody who was currently in the library. "I did want to try writing a mystery," she said to herself, "Might as well use this as practice."

The library's staff was able to lift up the bookshelves that had fallen over in the accident.

"Luckily they're too solid to be really damaged sir," the janitor told Shizuku's father.

Carefully stepping over the veritable sea of books, Shizuku went to get a closer look at the shelves.

"These seem the same," she commented to herself. But she knew there had to be something she wasn't seeing.

"Ok, careful, careful…." Shizuku's father advised as the shelves were lifted back up, trying to repair the damage as swiftly as possible.

As Shizuku looked over the shelves, eventually she caught something that seemed out of place. "What's this groove on the bottom?" she asked herself.

"We should get to Seiji's place," Yuko spoke up, "I still want to deliver the magazine to Sugimura."

"You have a point," Shizuku nodded, "We can come back here afterwards. I'll have homework to do anyways…"

…..

At the Amasawa Antiques Shop, Seiji and Sugimura were helping with the remodeling of the building.

"Ok, is it the right angle yet?" Sugimura asked.

"Almost," Seiji replied, making some careful adjustments with a screwdriver.

Shizuru and Yuko went around to the back entrance, because the view of the city the balcony provided was simply beautiful. It was among the most awe-inspiring sights either girl had seen.

"Hey, we're back," Shizuru smiled, getting a glance at the Baron statue that inspired her first story.

"Sweet, did you get the journal I wanted?" Sugimura asked the girls.

"Yeah, we did, but you'll never believe what happened at the library," Yuko nodded.

"What happened?" Seiji asked.

"Lots of the shelves fell down," Shizuku informed the boys, "It's a complete mess down there."

"That sucks," Sugimura said, "Your dad's the one who runs the place, right?"

"He's really upset about all this," Shizuku nodded in confirmation, "And I was hoping I could help him fix the mess."

"Then if you wanted to do that, shouldn't you be back at the library?" Seiji commented.

"Ya see….that's the thing," Yuko replied, "Shizuku is looking at the accident a bit differently."

"What does that mean?" Sugimura asked the girls.

"I'm saying that I think someone intentionally sabotaged the library," Shizuku revealed.

"No way," the boys gasped in reply.

"And since I was thinking about trying out a mystery story for my next shot at writing," the high schooler explained, "I've learned that one cannot rule out anybody so easily. I want to talk to you guys."

Both Seiji and Sugimura knew they couldn't get out of this.

….

The young ones used Seiji's violin crafting room for interrogations.

"We've both been busy all day working here," Seiji explained, "We didn't go to the library even when we took a lunch break."

"Are you certain you constantly saw each other?" Shizuku asked.

"Do we really need to tell you again?" Sugimura replied, "Yes, we did." He was currently twisting the screwdriver he had been using in a clockwise pattern to provide himself some entertainment.

"What about last night?" Shizuku continued, "The library is open till 11 P.M, after all."

"I was practicing my violin playing after I finished building a new one," Seiji said, "Country Roads has become my new favorite," he winked at his girlfriend.

"I was heading to the store," Sugimura said, "So I'm afraid no one saw me then. I was just going to grab a soda."

"It couldn't have been either of them," Yuko told Shizuku, "So let's just stop with the accusations and all be friends here."

"Maybe you have a point," Shizuku nodded, "I mean, this time of year it's not too busy, there shouldn't be a crowd, let's go see if we can help."

"We got most of the remodeling done," Seiji smiled, "If you want, we can come down too."

"Thanks Seiji," Shizuku smiled, giving the young violin maker a kiss.

"I think we should get going," Sugimura said, still a bit uncomfortable at the sight of romance.

…

The 4 high schoolers made their way back to the Tama Hills library.

"Welcome back," Mr. Tsukishima called, "Shizuku, could you help me with this?"

"Yes father," Shizuku nodded, going over to aid him.

"The shelves must've gotten too damaged in the fall, sir," the library's janitor said, "They won't stay stable."

"For cripes sake," Mr. Tsukishima frowned, "These were brand new just last year. I think the contractor screwed us over here."

As Shizuku was doing her best to help keep damage control, she noticed something on the ground. She picked up the small object. "A screw?" she said to herself.

….

A few minutes later, Shizuku overheard some of the other library attendees talking.

"It's true, you guys have to believe me," a student who appeared to still be in middle school told his friends, "Some invisible force tripped me!"

"Do you think it was the tanuki playing a prank on you?" another one of the boys laughed.

"Not funny guys," the boy frowned, as Shizuku walked over.

"What makes you say something like that?" she asked the boy.

"I was walking between the rows to pick up a book for my biology class when out of nowhere, I felt something trip me. I looked around, but there was no one right by me or anything lying on the floor. I don't get it," the boy explained.

Suddenly, a thought began to form in Shizuku's head. The explanation she had been provided began to give her a clearer image of what happened at the library earlier that day.

"Thank you," Shizuku smiled, going over to where her friends were.

Picking up the sports journal, Shizuku noticed a tiny hole that had been punctured in it.

"What's the matter Shizuku?" Yuko asked.

"I know who the culprit is," Shizuku revealed.

…..

"Really?" Mr. Tsukishima asked, impressed, "Tell us who did it then."

"Gotcha," Shizuku smirked, getting confident, she wished her older sister was there at the library so she could have bragged about this, but alas, she had moved out of the house by this point.

"The culprit is you…..Sugimura!" Shizuku revealed.

"Me?!" Sugimura laughed, "Have you gone stone cold mental, Shizuku? I wasn't even at the library today…."

"I'm not crazy," Shizuku replied, "You just decided to make use of a clever trick to give yourself an airtight alibi."

"Please explain," Seiji encouraged.

"You got it," Shizuku nodded, going into the supply closet to get some materials. "I'll give you points for creativity," she told Sugimura, "First, you took some magnets and some fishing wire. You attached a magnet to the shelf on the far most end of the row. You then rigged a fishing line to it, which you pulled taught through the next couple of shelves."

With Yuko's help, they pushed it through several rows. "That's what caused the groove in the bottom of the shelf, the wire is known for leaving these kinds of marks."

Sugimura was slowly developing a sweat, "Well, then what happens in your little theory?"

"Glad you asked," Shizuku smiled in response, "You pierced a hole in the book you asked Yuko to pick up. You knew these types of books weren't likely to be checked out, so you'd be certain she'd be the first to grab it."

"And is that why I tripped?" the boy from earlier asked, "Because it was the wire?"

"Yup," Shizuku nodded, "You wrapped a wire around the pierced hole in the journal. You simply stopped by the library last night and went about without being seen?"

"But where's your proof I did any of this?" Sugimura asked.

"Your screwdriver," Shizuku revealed, "For added measure, you unscrewed some of the screws to ensure there would be a bigger mess. Once Yuko pulled on the journal, your plan went just as expected."

"But why?" Yuko asked, surprised.

"Because, I wanted to hide something from you, Yuko," Sugimura admitted, "I had written a cheesy love poem and hid in in the shelf of your favorite section, but upon reflection I realized how lame it was and I didn't want you to see that. So I caused a mess when I forgot the specific spot I put it in."

"That's sweet….and really stupid," Yuko admitted, "You know you can't get out of picking up the mess, right?"

"I know…" Sugimura responded.

…..

Later that day, as Seiji and Shizuku were headed back up to the antiques shop, they were having a friendly chat.

"You did really well in the role of a detective," Seiji complimented, "Maybe you should make that one of your other jobs."

"Cmon Seiji," Shizuku laughed, "You know that being a writer is my dream. All I need is some inspiration for my stories, that's all."

All of a sudden, the two covered their eyes when a figure appeared out of nowhere in front of them. It was the Baron.

"A cat in a fancy suit?" Seiji asked, baffled.

"It looks like….the Baron!" Shizuku realized.

"Indeed, m'lady," the Baron bowed, shocking the couple again, "And I've come to invite you both to a very important event."

The humans had no idea for the ride they were about to embark on.

…

Outside the realm of fiction, a certain man received a very special piece of mail.

"Virtual reality?" a guy wearing glasses, a hat, and a tie read off, "Ok, they have to be ripping me off somehow."

There was an additional note at the bottom of the letter that read as follows:

"Attending demonstration will provide users with 1 free Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3 VHS/DVD bombing."

"I'm sold!" the man smiled.

Who is this man, you might ask? Oh, he's someone who likes to look back to the past, a man who is very critical about a good number of media past, be it tv or movies.

This man is the Nostalgia Critic. He remembers it so you don't have to.

And he and some of the other critics from were about to embark on an unexpected adventure.


	2. Mutiny Among Thieves

**The Toon Files Episode 93: Mutiny Among Thieves.**

While the final preparations to the technology were being made at the Toon Detective Complex, things were abuzz back in Toon Town as well.

Basil of Baker Street agreed to pay the fee for the complex to rent out the entire event hall.

Chowder, now a full-fledged chef in his own right, agreed to do the catering. "The biggest thing ever requires the best food ever!" the cat smiled, now co-owning a business with the Great Chef Wildcat himself.

….

While a lot of the toons from all of the worlds were focusing on the new beginning, a certain married couple was thinking of closing a chapter in their life.

"Are you sure?" Rabbit asked Fox.

"Yeah, I am," Fox nodded, "After everything we've gone through, I think it's time we leave the force…."

"But what about our kids?" Rabbit pointed out.

"I didn't say we'd give up all kinds of work," Fox replied, "It's just….after getting caught up in that attack a few months ago, it really got me thinking about my own mortality, ya know? We've been on the force for over a decade Rabbit, maybe we just aren't as skilled as we used to be…."

"I see your point," Rabbit nodded to his wife, "If something happened to both or just one of us….we can't let our kids be alone. But that raises one more question."

"What is that?" Fox asked.

"Really, who can be our replacements?" Rabbit explained, "We've been among the highest ranking cops for years. Should we really leave all the rookies to fend for themselves?"

"Funny you should mention that," Fox smirked, "There's two people I think you should meet…."

…

At the Toon Town Police HQ, the people Fox was expecting were there.

They were a raccoon named Sly Cooper and a fox named Carmelita Fox.

"Inspector Fox, Constable Cooper, nice to meet you," Fox smiled, shaking their paws.

"The pleasure's ours," Carmelita replied, "We're just here to drop off a petty thief before going back to our latest assignment."

"Then why didn't you just drop the perp off in your world?" Rabbit asked, "You both are Interpol agents, I'm certain you'd have access to a prison."

"That's the thing," Sly smirked, "This assignment we're on is not confined to our world. Carmelita and I were called in because we're the best there is."

"Can you tell us about this case you just finished for now?" Fox asked.

"Sure," Carmelita nodded as the suspect was taken to the holding cells.

….

**Paris, France, 2006.**

Sly Cooper was a master thief. Though, like Robin Hood, he didn't steal from the innocent. He and his friends robbed other thieves. Sly was an orphan after his parents were killed, but over the years he defeated the gang who killed them as well as other criminals. All the while, he was chased by the ever vigilant Carmelita.

After their last heist to get inside the Cooper Family vault, Sly faked amnesia so he could finally be with Carmelita, whom he had a crush on for a while now. He went along with her saying she was her partner in Interpol, and now they were living happily together in Paris.

Sly still kept in touch with his old gang, among them were Bentley the genius turtle, who had been in a wheelchair since a past accident, Murray the hippo, the muscle of the group, Penelope Mouse, Bentley's crush and fellow gadgeteer, Dimitri, a lizard who spoke in 70s lingo, and the Panda King, a former member of the gang who was responsible for the death of Sly's parents, but the fire expert had since reformed his ways.

…

In their apartment one evening, Sly and Carmelita were finishing up dinner.

"7 crooks brought down with my shock pistol and lasagna," Carmelita smirked, "Today has been a good day."

"You know it," Sly smirked, kissing his girlfriend after wiping his lips.

It was then Sly's cell phone rang. Looking at the number, he realized who it was from-Bentley.

"Hang on, I gotta take this call," Sly smiled, stepping out into the hallway to "get better reception."

"Bentley, what's up?" Sly asked his old friend.

"We need you to come down to the old hideaway Sly," the turtle explained, "We have a mystery going on right now….something's not right."

"I'll be there, just give me time to work up an excuse to Carmelita," Sly explained. He still kept the amnesia act up.

…..

Sly took his patrol car to get back to his old hangout.

"Well, if it isn't Sly Cooper," Murray smiled, hugging his friend as soon as he stepped outside.

"Nice to see you too Murray…" Sly gasped for breath until the hippo released him. "So what happened here?"

"You see Sly," Bentley explained, rolling over on his wheelchair, "The rest of the crew and I had recently stolen a very valuable vase. But ThiefNet was offline for a little while, so to keep it safe, we put it in a room at the end of a special security hall Penelope and I made."

"So what's the problem?" Sly asked.

"You see, despite our security measures, someone got through the hallway and stole the vase," Penelope spoke up.

"Well, doesn't that simply mean someone disabled the alarms?" Sly figured.

"That isn't possible," the Panda King replied, "The security reports say the system was never deactivated."

"Then probably just someone sneaky got through the laser halls," the master thief deduced.

"Um, Sly, you may want to check this out…" Bentley said, going over to the hall and signaling for Sly to follow.

….

Sly and the others went over to the security hallway. "What's so special about this?" the raccoon former thief now Interpol officer asked.

"This," Bentley replied flatly, pressing a button, exposing the security beams, which covered practically every inch of the hallway.

"Whoa," Sly commented, impressed, "You really went all out on this, I'm proud of you guys."

"Now it looks like the culprit smashed the windows on the way out," Panda King pointed, "But there's still the fact of the matter of how they got into the room with the vase?"

"Lemme guess," Sly smirked, "It shows no signs of having been smashed open, either?"

"You got it Sly," Bentley nodded, "The only way to get into that room is to use the passcode to unlock the door. Just like old times," he reminisced, "And that's where my concerns were arisen."

"What for?" Sly questioned.

"The only ones who know the passcode are the 5 of us," Penelope said.

"So, one of you is a thief to other thieves, eh?" Sly smirked slyly, "This should be interesting."

….

The band of thieves were beginning where to turn to solve the case.

"How long can you be out Sly before Carmelita wonders where you are?" Murray asked, putting on his racing goggles.

"Don't worry," Sly replied, "Being a constable now, I can just say I'm out chasing a thief. Give me an hour, and I probably could find an actual one."

"It must be snowing, can you dig it?" Dimitri pointed out.

Sly saw that near the wheels of his patrol car, there was a tiny white powder. "Nothing important," Sly told his allies, "Let's focus on finding who took that vase. How did you discover it had gone missing?"

"We heard the security alarm going off," Panda King replied, "So we thought the culprit could not have gone too far away."

"And once we found the room in the condition it was in, we put 2 and 2 together," Bentley explained to Sly.

"Then you can count me, the great Constable Cooper on the case," Sly smiled, acting in his new persona.

"Great, and I thought Murray got hammy," Bentley groaned.

"You mean THE MURRAY!" Murray grinned. Murray had the persona of a WWE fighter sometimes.

"So, the big question is how someone got through the hallway without setting off the sensors," Sly began, setting the basic facts of the case.

…..

The 6 friends went back into the Cooper Gang Hideout.

"You saved articles about the arrests I did, how nice," Sly smiled, looking around the room, "But, enough about me, I'll get back to the case."

"Too bad we never made a lie detector," Penelope said to Bentley.

"Say Penelope, when did you start wearing glitter?" Sly asked the mouse.

"Glitter? Uh….recently," Penelope said.

"So, when can we get to the bottom of this cheeseroll?" Dimitri asked.

"The what?" Panda King asked, baffled by the 70s lingo that Dimitri learned via the shows he learned English with.

Sly looked over the path of the security lasers again. Members of the team like Murray and Panda King were too big to get even a foot through the hall, and even Penelope and Bentley, who were fairly small, were not small enough to make it through without triggering the beams.

"Bentley," Sly spoke up, "Was there any single that the hallway had been deactivated or tampered with around the time of the theft?"

"No," Bentley replied, "And that's what's baffling me. Unless one of us secretly knows magic, one of us managed to walk through an entire hall of active security beams."

"This just got interesting," Sly smirked, always up for a challenge.

….

Sly began interrogating his old gang about their alibis.

"I was playing the PS3 at the time," Murray said, "Sony is awesome."

Sly nodded in agreement, "We can check the records on the console, so I'll take you off the suspects list," he told his hippo friend.

"I was planning my next invention," Penelope explained, "An RC tank with mini blasters, I figured I'd want to contribute to combat somehow."

"Anyone see you working?" Sly asked.

"No, I'm afraid not," Penelope nodded.

"Don't leave the area," Sly said teasingly, turning to the Panda King and Dimitri.

"I was talking on the phone with my daughter back in China," Panda King said. The reason the gang was able to trust their former enemy was that they saw he had a good side because of how he cared for his daughter, who they all teamed up to rescue from a forced marriage.

"I'll look into the phone records," Bentley told Sly, "To see if his story checks out."

Sly was pacing back and forth, not sure where to look for clues. He took out his signature cane, which the others had kept after Sly left to be with Carmelita.

As he looked out the window, he saw a young teenage cat notice him. "Oh crap, it's the 5-0!" he panicked, taking off.

"I'll be right back guys," Sly told the others, "I have some police work to attend to," he smirked.

….

Being fast on his feet, Sly was able to catch up with the feline. "Halt!" the constable raccoon exclaimed.

"I'm sorry, officer!" the cat begged, getting onto his knees. "I didn't mean to trip the alarm!"

"What alarm?" Sly asked, confused.

"I was walking through an alleyway, when all of a sudden a security beam was right in front of me, and I tripped it, I didn't mean to!" he explained in a panicked cry.

"It appeared right in front of you?" Sly asked, confused.

"I didn't know I was trespassing," the cat apologized, "Please don't throw me behind bars!"

This piece of information was beginning to give Sly an idea of what happened. "Don't worry, you're not in trouble," he assured the cat.

Sly went back over to his patrol car. He noticed that the front tires had been popped slightly.

"I think I know how this went down," Sly said to himself, "But there's one detail I can't figure out…."

The raccoon walked back into the security hallway. "You're the one piece that's still missing," he mentioned.

Sly then noticed he had something in his pocket. "Carmelita's makeup mirror," he laughed, "Guess I must've grabbed this off of her and forgot about it."

Being somewhat smug, Sly opened the mirror to get a good look at his smile, when he took a few steps forward. The glass did not set off the alarms.

Instead, it gave Sly the answers to the mystery.

….

"So what was that all about Sly?" Murray asked as Sly came back to the rest of the gang.

"A useful detour," Sly smiled in reply, "It provided me with a lot of things I needed to solve this case."

"Really?" Bentley smiled, curiously raising an eyebrow, "Who was it?"

"The thief among this gang of thieves…." Sly grinned, "Is you…..Penelope!"

"Me?" the mouse girl said, surprised, "What makes you think that?"

"Well, first let me explain the trick," Sly replied, "You managed to simply walk through the hallway when all the lasers were active."

"How could she do that?" the Panda King asked.

"Using an armor of mirrors," Sly revealed, "The one thing I learned while I was away is that glass mirrors do not trigger the security beams in the same way. They bounce off reflective surfaces, as I saw with my foxy lady's mirror."

"Interesting," Bentley complimented his girlfriend under the assumption that Sly had figured it out.

"And for added insurance, you busted the windows in the hallway out beforehand just in case the security lasers bouncing managed to hit you. The alarm going off wasn't because of your movements, it was that one of the lasers that reflected out of the window got tripped by a teen walking past."

"Where's your proof it was me?" Penelope asked Sly.

"Well, there's the fact my car tires are popped," Sly explained, "That wasn't snow lying on the ground, that was the glass armor you shattered afterward to cover your tracks. But the biggest piece of evidence is right on your very person, Penelope."

"Really?" Penelope asked.

"Yeah, what I thought was glitter was actually tiny bits of glass," Sly revealed, carefully grabbing up some of the shards, confirming his deduction.

"All right, you win," Penelope admitted rather casually, "I wanted to sell the vase by myself so I could have enough coin to get Bentley a surprise birthday gift."

"Really?" Bentley blushed. Penelope kissing him served as answer enough.

…

All was well and good, when all of a sudden the gang heard another cop car coming their way.

"It's Carmelita!" Sly realized, "You have to get out of here quick!"

"But what if she asks why you were here?" Murray asked.

"I'll take the fall," Penelope volunteered, "I was the thief here anyways. Besides, I know you guys can bust me out," she grinned.

"We'll be sure to lend you a hand soon, Sly!" Bentley called as the gang took off.

"Who did you catch, Sly?" Carmelita asked, running into the hideout.

"Ah, a simple thief," Sly smirked to his girlfriend, "We can take her back to headquarters."

"I'm afraid we'll have to make a detour," Carmelita said.

"What do you mean?" Sly asked, confused.

"What I mean is that we've been called on a job that isn't confined to just our world," Carmelita revealed grimly.

…

"So, my partner here caught a thief, and since the portal to Toon Town was nearby, we've decided to drop her off here," Carmelita explained, still unaware that Sly was not truly suffering amnesia.

"So, get behind bars, you thief," Sly pointed convincingly to Penelope. She nodded and did so, though only she saw the subtle wink he gave to her.

"So, what is this big operation?" Fox asked Sly and Carmelita.

"We've been informed of a series of notable crimes in many of the other worlds," Carmelita informed.

"Like what?" Rabbit asked, curious to know.

"Some big ones," Sly informed, "All involving actions against high authorities and defenses."

"Give some examples," Fox encouraged.

"The sultan in Agrabah has been brutally killed," Carmelita informed grimly, "And there was a bombing at the city hall in Holbrook."

"Holbrook?" Rabbit spoke aloud, "That's the town that had the junkyard prison!"

"That was our very first big case," Fox nodded, "I think we should get involved too, dear. A last big case, if you will."

…..

But what neither Fox, Rabbit, Sly, or Carmelita could have possibly known is that they were at the beginning of the biggest case any of them have ever seen, something that would affect lots and lots of toons….


	3. Current Incident

**The Toon Files Episode 94: Current Incident.**

In the world of Twilight Town, someone was heading for the Toon Detective Complex. In the mysterious figure's hand was a disk, which the stranger kept a close grip on.

"I'll be needing you," the figure chuckled to himself, looking at the disk, "You're the next step in the big plan. They won't be able to stop me…."

A storm was coming, and the toons didn't know that they needed to batten down the hatches before it was too late.

…..

The Baron, using his magic, warped Shizuru and Seiji into the TDC. "Welcome to my new place of operations," the magical cat told the two humans.

"This is amazing," Shizuru said, "None of my story ideas were anything like this."

"So you're all detectives huh?" Seiji asked, looking at all the technology.

"Most of us," Rarity replied, stepping out of her lab, "I work mainly in the mechanics department. It's a natural use of my brilliant talents in fashion."

"So, if this is a place where lots of sleuths work," Shizuru began, "Is there some place I can do some research? I wanna write a mystery story."

"Maybe not enough time to look through old files," Francis said, "The connection to the real world is about to be established."

"Real world?" Shizuru asked, confused.

"We'll explain it to you later," Jimmy said, "But for now, our rides to the town hall are here."

Several limos that were specially equipped to travel between worlds arrived right outside the complex.

"We'll just be finishing up the final touches," Double D told his fellow detectives.

"We'll be right behind you," Mantis and Twilight nodded, "I mean, this is all our efforts paying off, after all."

None of them knew the figure making his or her way towards the TDC.

…..

In the real world, the Nostalgia Critic arrived at the convention hall, where he found some of his fellow reviewers from . Among them were JesuOtaku the anime reviewer, Film Brain the British movie reviewer, Nostalgia Chick, the cynical and more analytical critic, Paw Dugan the cheerful musical movies critic, Obscurus Lupa, the girl who loves bad B-movies, Blockbuster Buster, one of the more recent additions to the site, Todd in the Shadows, the pop music critic who never shows his face, the Cinema Snob, the snobby critic who gets stuck reviewing x-rated material, Nash, the internet radio show host, Marzgurl, the critic who loves both western animation and anime, as well as Phelous, the critic who dies a lot.

"Wait, you got an invitation too?" Lupa asked the Critic.

"Why is that odd?" the Nostalgia Critic asked.

"Because whenever we're all gathered, it's one of your hair-brained schemes," the Cinema Snob said.

"For once, I am as in the dark as you guys are," the Critic assured.

Some of the reviewers did not know what they were about to fall into…..

…..

In the limos going into Toon Town, Knuckles and Rouge talked with Seiji and Shizuku.

"If you're curious into looking up mysteries," Rouge said, turning on a tv, "You can watch one of our recorded cases from our database," the bat girl offered.

"Cool," Shizuku nodded, looking at the screen as the case began.

…

**East Australia Current, 2004.**

Visiting old friends is a fun experience. For Marlin the clown fish, he was going to go see his old friend (quite literally old) Crush, the sea turtle. Once again the old turtle was in the East Australia Current, which was like surfing for the turtles.

"How's it hanging dude?" Crush asked.

"I'm fine," Marlin said, "Dory's watching Nemo back at the reef."

"Sweet, man," Crush replied, "I want you to meet my nephews and nieces. Come over he," the old turtle chuckled.

The two girl turtles, named Rock and Roll, drifted over to the father clownfish. "Pleased to make your acquaintance," Rock bowed.

Roll, on the other fin, preferred silence and simply gave a happy gesture toward Marlin. The clownfish noticed that Roll was wearing a loop of seaweed around her neck like it was a necklace.

"Knarly," Smash, the older of Crush's nephews grinned, "Uncle Crush told us all about you dude."

"Indeed," Bam nodded, the only one of the group who did not speak in surfer lingo.

"Quiet down," Rave, one of the older turtles said, "You youngins never shut up."

"Sorry," Rock replied sarcastically.

…..

The evening came. The currents were picking up.

"Keep your flippers stretched dude," Crush advised Marlin, "It keeps you going faster so ya don't get left behind."

"Got it," Marlin nodded, not wanting to be left behind in trends.

"Are you fine with us now?" Bam asked Rave, who already had his fins stretched. The older turtle didn't reply.

"Loser," Smash chuckled, floating forward.

"Wake up sis," Rock tolled Roll, "You'll fall behind. If ya sleep here, your fins close up."

Roll nodded silently.

"Man, for someone so fun loving like yourself you have a lot of rules," Marlin told Crush.

"It's all how we go with the flow little dude, go with the flow…" Crush smiled. Marlin landed on the turtle's shell so he could have a place to rest for the night.

…..

The next morning, Marlin was in for a surprising awakening.

"Oh no, no no, this ain't right, man…" Crush was heard saying.

"What's going on?" Marlin asked the friend he met on the journey to find his son.

"It's Rave, dude….he's dead," Crush revealed regretfully.

"Dead?!" Marlin gasped, "You can't possibly be serious?!"

"I'm afraid he is," Bam nodded regretfully, "He must've died overnight, not too long ago. We noticed his fins weren't stretched out, and we were worried he was going to get left behind. But when we checked, it looks like….something had bitten him."

"I'm so sorry," Marlin apologized. He had dealt with the death of almost his entire family because of one sea predator. Though his son Nemo managed to survive, the memories would never go away of that tragic day.

"This is so messed up man!" Rock cried.

Roll nodded in agreement with her sister.

"Who could have killed her?" Smash asked.

"Killed her?" Marlin said, surprised, "You think this was murder?"

"Well duh," Smash replied, "We're not idiots. We know Rave wasn't exactly the raddest dude in this current. Lots of us really didn't like him, ya know."

"So what are you dudes saying?" Crush asked his nieces and nephews.

"I think I get it, Crush," Marlin told the turtle, "That someone along this current murdered Rave."

"Murder?" That's so totally twisted dude," Crush gasped.

"And, as your friend, I'm going to help you Crush," Marlin promised, "I'll find out who the killer is."

"Thanks little dude," Crush nodded appreciatively.

…..

Back in the limos, Jimmy and Francis were having a conversation.

"There have been reports that there have been sightings of intruders outside the base," the cat informed the Japanese detective.

"I know," Jimmy nodded, "Though this case does not seem to be the work of terrorists. After what happened earlier this year, the defenses to the core have been made secure."

"And we were able to round out most of the escaped criminals from the cells…." Francis nodded, "But based on our records, not all of them have been caught."

Jimmy nodded, concerned. "Catching them is our number one priority. But any criminal in there knows better than to try and make such a risky move as to commit more crimes. They know well that they are on our records."

"Honestly," Dawn said, "I'm sensing that this might be the first time in a while we can have enjoyment without worry."

"Are you sure your predictions are still accurate Dawn?" Coco asked, the bandicoot was concerned, "You got the lunch menu for the last few weeks wrong, after all."

"Even the spirits of nature can be wrong every once in a while," Dawn replied.

Seiji and Shizuru kept watching the video of the demonstration case. "Are there any others?" Seiji asked the Baron.

"We have an entire computer database of these," the Baron nodded, "You would be impressed."

The young couple kept watching the recorded case.

…..

In the East Australia Current, Marlin was going around asking the other sea turtles about their alibis.

"Darn it, there's no way, it just can't be…" the father clownfish kept telling himself. The various testimonials from the ones that he had questioned were making him think of a bad possibility: that the killer was one of Crush's nieces and nephews.

"What did you find, orange dude?" Crush asked.

Marlin gulped. Even though Crush didn't take most things as seriously as he did, Marlin knew he would get upset with the conclusions the clownfish had reached.

"Well, Crush, and please promise me you won't get mad," Marlin said preemptively.

"Sure little dude, but what did ya find?" Crush nodded, not sure where Marlin was going.

"Well, I swam in front and behind the rest of the turtles on the current, and I asked them some questions. Questions like where were they, at what times in the time were they at those places, did anyone see them, ya know, the usual…."

"And?" Crush asked, still not prepared for the reveal.

"Based on all the answers I've been given, the most logical conclusion I can deduct is that the killer was one of Smash, Rock, Bam, or Roll," Marlin finally blurted.

Crush, in his good-natured self, refused to believe that. "You really are a clownfish. Good joke dude! By the way, watch those algae rocks."

"Wha?" Marlin asked confused, when he saw a bunch of green rocks between to stick to him.

"Don't worry, those small fish with the sharp teeth will come to eat that stuff up," Crush assured.

"Ok…" Marlin said, concerned, "But in all seriousness, there is a high chance that one of those four is the killer."

"No way, just no way," Crush laughed, refusing to belief the smaller fish's words, "I know those 4 like I know the back of my fins, little man."

"Look, I'll talk to them," Marlin said, "I will give you that there is a chance that none of them are the killer."

…..

Rock, Roll, Smash, and Bam were called over by Marlin.

"What?" Rock chuckled, "You can't be for real, are you little guy?"

"I'm serious, I'm afraid," Marlin nodded, "All of the other turtles have alibis that have been backed up. You 4 don't."

"Do you know what the time of death was?" Smash asked.

"Around 6 in the morning, from what I've examined," Marlin explained.

"That can't be right," Rock said, "We saw Rave around 8 with his fins stretched. If that dude was dead than, there is no freakin way he could have had his flippers stretched."

"Huh, really?" Marlin replied, surprised.

"I know the times of the currents around these parts," Smash nodded, "He had to still have been alive then."

Marlin looked around to see if there were any odd things about the 4 turtles. None of them appeared to have markings of the victim's blood, but then again this was underwater.

Roll was being extra protective of her seaweed necklace now, Marlin noticed. "How come she doesn't talk?" he asked Rock.

"She's shy, duh," Rock responded.

Bam was scratching his shell. "What on earth is this itch?" he asked himself.

"I got some gunk on me," Smash frowned, noticing a green streak on his shell.

"We'll keep in touch," Marlin told the younger turtles as he swam away.

…..

Marlin returned to where Rave's family was taking care of his body. "We have to give respect to the dead, dude," Rave's sister said to the others.

"Especially after all those tiny fishes keep trying to bite him," Rave's brother nodded.

All of a sudden, Marlin gasped. Could it be-he knows how the murder was done? He swam over and saw that tiny bite marks were around Rave's fins.

"Sorry Crush," Marlin said to himself, "But the killer is one of those four."

…..

Once again, Marlin made his way across the current back to Crush and the younger turtles.

"I know who did it," he told the group.

"You do?" Crush asked, "Tell me who the psycho is, little dude."

"I'm sorry, but….the killer's you, Smash!" Marlin blurted.

"Whoa? What?!" Smash laughed in disbelief. "Are you doing seaweed, bro?"

"I'm not kidding," Marlin replied, "I know how you killed Rave and established an alibi."

"But they saw where I was at 8," Smash said.

"That would be true…if the time of death was really that," Marlin retorted, "Rave was actually killed at 6, and I know how you did it."

"How did he?" Rock gasped.

"He used the algae rocks," Marlin explained, "You first bit Rave to death then you placed several of the algae rocks along his body to keep his flippers held up. That way, he would still look alive even after the time of death. And that was just phase 1 of you plan. Secondly, you knew the algae rocks would eventually attack the fish who like to eat them. So they were able to swim into the current and chew it up, lowering his flippers."

"You have any proof of that bro?" Crush asked, hoping this wasn't the truth.

"There is, I'm afraid," Marlin nodded, "Firstly, there's the bite marks around the flippers from the tiny fish. They were attracted by the scent of the algae rocks, after all. But the biggest clue is on Smash himself…..the algae rocks left a mark on his shell!"

"Noo…" Smash said, looking down towards the ocean's surface in horror.

"It was you?" Bam gasped.

"Like, why man?" Rock frowned in disappointment.

"What that dude was planning was terrible," Smash explained, "He was planning to kill you Uncle Crush so he could get the title of oldest turtle in the reef."

"Geez…." Crush said, unsure how to feel.

Then, out of nowhere, Roll finally spoke up. "What you did is totally wrong bro," Roll said in a tone that sounded much like a mentor, "Two wrongs don't make a right, man. Evil only begats evil, that can't be changed," Rock's sister continued.

"Wow….that's deep sis," Rock complimented.

"I'll deal with your punishment," Crush told his nephew. "Thanks for solving the case, little dude."

"Don't mention it," Marlin replied, "I probably should be getting home to Nemo and my other friends."

"Just take the next turn," Crush instructed.

…..

Seiji and Shizuru finished watching the mystery.

"Pretty clever trick," Seiji said.

"I wish I could visit this world," Shizuru commented with a smile.

"We'll look into finding time," the Baron told the young writer, "We have portals to all the worlds, that one included."

"We're almost here, everyone," Francis called to the detectives (and their guests) over a special PA system built into the limos.

"Let's just hope the Twilight and the other tech guys show up on time," said Rarity, looking at the clock.

…..

"Are you almost done?" Twilight and Mantis asked Double D.

"Just give me a minute," the young man who had lived n the Cul-de-sac replied, "I just have to finish rendering the image."

Suddenly, Mantis noticed a weird image appear on his computer screen. "The hell…." He said to himself, jumping up to get a better look.

Twilight and Double D saw the same message/image appear on their monitors as well.

"It's a computer virus!" Twilight quickly realized.

"What's it trying to get?" Mantis said, trying to activate the anti-viral program as fast as he could.

"This is odd," Double D said, as he examined the monitors, "This virus….it's not stealing info. It's destroying it!"

"We can't lose the complex's security plans!" Twilight panicked.

"It's not going after the security…." Mantis realized, "It's…..effecting our database of past cases."

Try as they might, the complex's scientists were unable to prevent the virus from deleting the data on their old cases.

"Why would someone do this?" Mantis asked, "Why would you infect our entire system just to essentially rob our file cabinet. All of that data was on closed cases."

"I have a very bad feeling about this," Twilight said, "We need to get to the others, and fast!"

….

The mystery man was walking away from the Toon Detective Complex. The figure laughed to himself.

"All according to plan," he smirked smugly, "The game is just beginning, my friends….."


	4. An Arm and One Less Leg

**The Toon Files Episode 95: An Arm and One Less Leg.**

In the real world, the various movie, video game, and music critics of made an observation.

"There's only 7 pods," Todd in the Shadows pointed out.

"So what's the point?" the Critic asked in reply, not always being the first to realize a problem.

"It means not even half of us can try these machines out," Lupa replied.

"Well, being the de facto leader of the site," the Critic said, "I think it's only fair I get one."

"Yeah right," Linkara said, "By virtue of defeating the Entity, I should get to try one of the pods!"

As a lot of the critics were arguing, some of the others, like the Nostalgia Chick and Cinema Snob tried to slip ahead.

"Hey!" Blockbuster Buster called seeing them try to pull a fast one on the rest of the critics. The race was on to try the virtual reality pods.

….

A lot of notable toons were in the audience at the Toon Town City Hall. Among the crowd was Mrs. Brisby and Justin, the Miao siblings Sagwa, Sheegwa, and Dongwa (Now older and the official royal scribes, with Dongwa being married to Han-Han, Princess Luna, Jack Skellington and Sally, Basil, Chowder, Tai Lung, Tigress, Po, Cloud, and Tifa.

"This is gonna be so awesome!" Po grinned to Tai Lung and Tigress, who've since had two cubs after being married for over a decade now.

"Indeed it will be," Tai Lung nodded. The Dragon Warrior and the snow leopard were great friends, they were practically brothers.

"I don't get it," Francis told Jimmy, "Where are the others? What could possibly be taking them so long to get here?"

"You know the scientific types," Jimmy replied, "They probably got caught up in some invention."

"Besides, they showed us how to use the pods, they are more or less pre-programmed," Abigail said.

Though the teen detective from Japan was still having feelings of uncertainty about all of this. But he could not imagine the sheer scale of what was soon to transpire….

…..

Rabbit, Fox, Sly, and Carmelita were taking an Interpol boat to get through one world.

"The body of the sultan….ugh," Rabbit shivered, "I did not know you could do that with a sword."

"And that message written in blood on the wall," Fox recalled, "Calling for death to all in Agrabah."

"Even if we catch the people behind this," Carmelita commented, "This could lead to a war, all things considered."

"And now we have to go through Wild Thing Island to get to our next stop," Sly said, "Let's hope they don't eat us."

…..

**Wild Thing Island, 2009.**

On an island that no one could quite pinpoint on a map lived several big monsters known simply as the wild things. There was Carol the leader, KW the motherly one, Judith the hyper one, Ira the "downer", Douglas the smart one, and Alexander, the one a lot of the wild things mostly ignored. They loved to just have fun, they had known a kid named Max before, but thanks to him, they all learned lessons on what was important in life.

The 4 officers intended to get to a portal on the other end of the island to reach their next stop, Thorn Valley.

"They've also received some threatening messages," Carmelita explained, "Though the circumstances seem different from what was in Agrabah."

But just as they got onto the shore, they heard some laughter.

"4 new snacks," Douglas smirked, he, Judith, Carol, and Ira approached Fox and the others, "And ones in authority, to boot."

"We're not anyone's food," Carmelita retorted, pulling out her shock pistol. "It would be shocking for you to try," she smirked.

"Let them go guys," KW spoke up. While she was just as into having fun and being wild as the other creatures, KW had a level of maturity that most of the others lacked, "They're clearly here on some big business, we should just let them go through."

"Thank you KW," Sly said. Having passed through the island before, the Interpol couple knew they could trust her.

But just when they thought this would be a walk in the park, a case came up.

…

Alexander was slowly and dizzily walking through the woods, his arms having been ripped off. Luckily, for the Wild Things, this wasn't fatal, they could be reattached.

"What the heck?" Rabbit gasped, seeing Alexander walk towards them with some painful groans.

"Oh…..it stings," Alexander groaned, resting against a tree.

"What happened to you?" Carmelita asked the Wild Thing.

"Someone ripped off my arms and now I can't find them," Alexander replied to the cops and Interpol officers.

"Should we keep going?" Rabbit asked his wife and new friends.

"No," Fox replied, "As officers of the law it's our duty to protect those who have been hurt. We'll find out who did this to you, sir."

"Thanks," Alexander said, "Especially since everyone else on this island mostly just ignores me. You guys are a real help."

"Don't mention it," Carmelita nodded, "Can you tell us who did this?"

"That's the thing," Alexander replied, "I don't know who it was. The last thing I remember was someone putting a plant to my face, and it made me all sleepy. When I awoke, I was standing on a big and cool plateau, with my arms ripped off. Your guess is as good as mine."

"So we have another whodunit," Sly smirked, "And I think we know who our suspects are."

…..

Sly, Carmelita, Rabbit, and Fox made their way back to the beach.

"Done already?" Carol asked the cops.

"No, in fact we're just getting started," Rabbit smirked in reply, "There's a mystery going on at this island!"

"What kind of caper?" Ira sighed, he was kind of the downer of the Wild Things.

"That," Sly pointed, as Alexander made his way to the shore. "Time for a nap," he yawned, just wanting to get some rest.

"Geez," Carol commented, "I haven't seen damage like that since….well," he was trying to forget that time where he went after their former "king", Max.

"Ok, let's begin the investigation," Carmelita said, "No one go off on your own. For now, the 5 of you are our prime suspects."

"Intriguing," Douglas commented.

…..

"You just HAD to lose your cell phone," Twilight frowned to Double D.

"Hey, I do all my communicating over a computer," Double D replied, "I rarely used my cell to begin with."

"We need to get to hall before the machines are activated," Twilight said, "Otherwise there could be disaster!"

"What kind of disaster?" Mantis asked, having been the least involved in the project out of all the scientists.

"Well, for starters, there could be glitches," Double D replied, "We're essentially warping reality with my invention. I have tested it before, on inanimate objects. It worked, but I think that the saboteur who damaged our files is trying to tamper with the pods."

"Wow…." Mantis frowned, "Way to be the absent-minded professor for once, Eddward."

"It's Double D," Double D frowned in embarrassment.

"Please guys," Twilight asked calmly, "We need to focus and work together to make sure this doesn't go wrong…."

Suddenly, a loud sound was heard. It didn't take them long to realize that it was a gunshot, and that their car was slowing down.

"Get armed and get down!" Double D called. The sound of air leaking meant that the scientists knew somewhat shot their tires out, greatly delaying their transportation.

"Someone doesn't want us to get there in time…" Twilight growled.

…

Back on Wild Thing Island, the 4 animal cops were questioning the suspects.

"Based on the examinations of Alexander's injuries," Sly read off, "I place the time of the crime to be around 1 PM. Where were you all then?"

"What's PM?" Carol asked. Being completely separate from other forms of society, there were some concepts the Wild Things just didn't know about.

"Right after lunch," KW suddenly spoke up, helpfully. KW had a better understanding of things then the rest of her friends.

"Right after lunch eh?" Carol smirked, "I was toppling the trees. I wanted to make the biggest and best tree fort of them all!"

"Where were we dear?" Ira asked Judith. The two of them were an item by Wild Thing standards.

Judith grinned, "We were wrestling, don't you remember?" she pointed out to Ira.

"Yeah, we were," Ira nodded rather gloomily. He wasn't the most energetic one.

"So the two of you have alibis," Carmelita noted, writing these facts down in her Interpol notebook.

Rabbit walked over to Fox. "I have two main suspects," he said to his wife, "There's Carol. I don't know why, but he seems like the…..drastic type." Rabbit nibbled a carrot after that comment.

"Who's the other?" Fox asked.

"KW," Rabbit explained, "She seems….a little too helpful."

Ira kept nibbling at Judith's fur.

"Stop it," she giggled.

"You have something stuck in your fur, dear," Ira said.

"You're just paranoid," Judith laughed.

At this time, Sly eyed Douglas.

…..

Fox and Rabbit followed after Carol and KW. "Did anyone see you bringing down trees?" Fox asked Carol.

"No, no one did," Carol admitted, "But they know I was working on that project. I wouldn't be doing anything different."

"He's very moody," Rabbit said to KW.

"That's his nature," KW sighed to Rabbit, "He may be big, but with Carol, there's just a giant kid inside. A big, scared kid who gets angry at times."

"Wow…" Rabbit said, feeling bad about having commented on that now.

"Don't mention it," KW said, picking up some flowers she really liked and putting them in her fur.

"Hey look," Fox pointed, "It's one of Alexander's arms!"

Fox and her husband went over to examine it. "We can haul it back to him," KW offered.

"Geez…." Fox commented, "It looks like the muscle in this arm was pulled really hard."

"The plateau Alexander described, it's right above," Rabbit pointed.

"So we know the scene of the crime for sure," Fox nodded, "Though we still haven't found any significant clues. I hope Sly and Carmelita are having better luck."

….

Sly and Carmelita were interrogating Douglas.

"What were you up to when Douglas had his arms ripped off?" Carmelita questioned.

"I was looking for dinner for everyone," Douglas explained, "Next to lunch and breakfast it's our favorite meal of the day."

"Obviously," Sly snarked under his breath.

"Were there any witnesses to you doing this?" Carmelita questioned. The fox inspector could sense that Douglas was not a malevolent beast, but her judgment had been wrong in the past, she wasn't forgetting the Neyla incident anytime soon.

"No, I'm afraid not," Douglas replied, "Though I heard Carol knocking down trees a little bit away."

It was then that Sly discovered the other one of Alexander's arms. "Gotcha!" Sly smirked, picking up the removed limb.

"What's this, Constable?" Carmelita said, going over to an area just past the limb.

"It looks like a rock with a vine wrapped around it," Sly pointed out in a matter of fact tone.

"We should go back to the shore," Carmelita said, "See if the Toon Town cops found any answers."

…

Alexander had woken up from his post limb-removal nap. "I feel somewhat better," he said though no one in particular was listening.

"We found your arms," the 4 officers of the law informed the Wild Thing as they got back to the beach.

"Sweet!" Alexander smiled, "Where did you find them?"

"Below the plateau you woke up on," Fox replied.

"Was there a rock by the arm for you too?" Carmelita asked.

"Yeah, now that I can recall, yeah," Rabbit realized.

It was then the Interpol officers began to get an image of what had happened. But to make sure, they double checked in the woods.

There was another rock that had some vines wrapped around it.

"Could it be?" Rabbit asked.

"It's directly across from where we found our arm of Alexander's," Sly nodded.

"We know who did it now," Carmelita informed.

…..

Carol, KW, Judith, Ira, Douglas, and Alexander were all on the beach when Rabbit, Fox, Sly, and Carmelita came back.

"You done yet?" Carol asked.

"In fact, yes," Sly smirked, "We know who the culprit is here."

"Really?" Alexander smiled, as Fox helped with the reinserting of the arms, "Can you tell me who did it?"

"Gladly," Rabbit replied, "The perp is none other than you…..JUDITH!" he pointed dramatically.

"Ok," Judith laughed, "I may be a downer, but I don't get desperate."

"Besides," Ira spoke up, "She has an alibi, just like I do. You said so yourselves."

"That's true," Carmelita replied, "But she managed to commit the crime from far away using a trick."

"What kind of trick? Like a prank?" Carol asked.

"No, she used a little technique involving rocks, vines, and special plants," Fox explained. "First, she drugged Alexander with the plants on the sticks, and brought him to the plateau."

"Then she tied vines around two rocks. With Alexander in the center, she put a vine in each arm, and pushed the rocks towards the edges. This essentially became a balancing act," Carmelita continued.

"Eventually, the weight of the rocks being held over the edges became too much, and they ripped Alexander's arms off," Sly finished, "That's why there was signs of muscles being pulled."

"Wow, you are smart, I'll give you that," Judith said, "I like smart food. But where's your proof it was me? It could just as easily have been Ira."

"Well, Ira was indeed the one who showed us the big clue, albeit by accident," Fox smirked in response, "He was picking at your fur earlier. Turns out, you forgot to remove the plant that you used to knock Alexander out on you."

"Ah nuts," Judith frowned, pulling out the aforementioned flower, "Ya got me, I'll admit."

"But why?" KW asked.

"You took my food last night," Judith frowned to Alexander, "So I made you pay. That's fair."

"Whatever," Alexander replied.

"Then I'm going with you," Judith said to the 4 cops, "I want a bite to eat, and you better bring it to me, or I'll chew you!"

"Whatever," Sly said, not actually worried about this.

"I'll go too," KW spoke up, "To keep an eye on her…."

"Be back soon," Carol encouraged.

….

Further down the path, Sly and Carmelita talked to Rabbit and Fox some more.

"Great, now we now have passengers," Sly said.

"Keep your appetite down, Judith," KW advised.

"You wish," Judith smirked in reply.

As the group was nearing the portal to Thorn Valley, the Interpol officers spoke up. "So, we did some background checks on you two before we stopped in Toon Town," Carmelita said.

"It makes sense that you're working with us on this case," Sly continued.

"What do you mean?" Rabbit asked, confused.

"You mean they didn't tell you what was found at the earlier crime?" Sly replied.

"No," the police couple nodded in reply.

…

In the real world, the internet critics had reached the VR pods. As everyone fought to get inside each of the 7, Bennett the Sage paused.

"My physic powers are telling us that danger awaits if we get in there," the anime/music reviewer said to his fellow critics. However, his words were mostly drowned out.

The Nostalgia Critic, wanting to take charge, leaped over the rest of his friends/fellow critics and into the first of the pods.

"Ha! Shotgun!" he laughed, as he was latched into the seat.

The next one to successfully get into a pod was Film Brain. Paw had gotten tripped by the Cinema Snob, allowing the British critic to climb in.

"Heh," Lupa commented, "They didn't notice this one to the far right?" She was the third to get into a pod. "Just hope Todd doesn't follow…"

Angry Joe and Marzgurl teamed up to each get pods. "You'll never beat us!" Joe laughed crazily, firing randomly. No one was hurt, however.

However, his laughter provided an opening for Paw to climb into the fourth VR pod. "Sweet," the music critic grinned.

"See you soon," JesuOtaku told Nash. She had used her red snark titled as a shield to knock others down as she climbed into the 5th pod.

"This would be a chance for me to critique virtual reality themed movies," the Nostalgia Chick shrugged, leaping over Cinema Snob. She tried to bring Todd in, but the pods only fit one person.

Only 1 VR pod remained. The audience watched as the remaining critics got into a tussle for it.

But who got into it managed to surprise the rest of the site's crew. "Nobody expects the Blockbuster Buster," the newest addition laughed.

As the pods were all filled, they activated suddenly.

"That was fast," Nash said.

But all of a sudden, the pods began to flash red lights.

"What's going on?!" Cinema Snob exclaimed.

From what the critics outside could see, it looked like the reviewers in the pods began to flicker. "TRANSFERING REALMS…" an electronic voice said.

The mayhem had begun.


	5. Riot on Set

**The Toon Files Episode 96: Riot on Set.**

At the Toon Town City Hall, the toon detectives managed to see that something was going wrong with the pods that would link to the real worlds.

"They're going haywire!" Rarity gasped.

"Dammit," Francis frowned, "Where the hell are Twilight and the others?" None of the detectives already at the event knew that the scientists had been left stranded far from the scene.

"It's people from the real world!" the Baton realized, seeing astral projections of the internet critics appearing inside the pods.

"Is this how they're supposed to work?" Shizuru asked, concerned.

"Not at all," Rouge nodded, looking at the pods. "They haven't been fully transferred. It says here they're caught in-between!"

"What does that mean?!" Knuckles gasped.

….

In an area that could be best described as a black void, the Nostalgia Critic, Nostalgia Chick, Obscurus Lupa, Paw, JesuOtaku, Film Brain, and the Blockbuster Buster all appeared in the center of the blackness.

"Where are we?" Paw asked.

"7 BEINGS LOCKED INTO TRAINING CASES," a computerized voice said to the critics.

"What do you mean?" Film Brain asked the voice.

"YOU WILL BE SENT INTO WORLDS LINKED WITH YOUR DATA," the voice replied.

"Worlds?" Critic said, "We haven't done a sci-fi adventure yet."

"TO PROCEED YOU MUST SOLVE THE MYSTERY IN EACH WORLD," the computer voice continued.

"Mysteries?" the Buster asked, "Have any of us reviewed any whodunnits?"

"None where the answer wasn't blatantly obvious-I'm looking at you, Burton's Sleepy Hollow," the Chick pointed out.

"We need to stay together guys," Lupa advised.

But just as she said that, each one of the 7 critics was thrust each towards 1 of 7 doors that appeared in a circle around them.

"Damn, one at a time?" JesuOtaku realized, "Now we can't suffer this crap together, then."

Each of the critics was pulled through their digital doors into their respective digital realms.

…..

Mantis, Double D, and Twilight were trying to fix their vehicle.

"Should we just go on foot?" Mantis suggested, "If we don't get there before they use the pods, their minds could get lost…."

"Twilight, you're the fastest of us," Double D said, "Could you try going on ahead?"

"Ok," Twilight nodded. Though she no longer worked in Ponyville, Twilight still valued friendship very heavily. The purple horse took off towards the portal to Toon Town, with a device Double D had given her.

"Something else on your mind?" Mantis asked Double D.

"Well, it's more than just my cell phone," Double D said, "By which I mean more of my inventions have seemed to vanish the past few weeks."

"Why haven't you said anything?" Mantis frowned.

"I was just hoping I was being clumsy, but my calculations are now pointing towards theft. And if that's the case, I'm sure it's the same person who uploaded that computer virus and slowed us down just down," Double D explained. "But one of the missing inventions really has me worried….."

It was at this time that the first of the virtual reality cases began.

…..

**Warner Brothers Studios, Hollywood, California, 1993.**

The Nostalgia Critic digitized into a big Hollywood studio. "So that's what being beamed is like," the movie reviewer commented.

Looking around, seeing he was now in an animated form, he realized what the CPU voice meant.

"Wow…is this the place from Animainiacs?" the NC smiled, not often being able to be at a place that gave him such genuine joy in his youth.

He waved to the VR versions of all his favorite characters as they walked past.

"Who's that Brain?" Pinky asked.

"Oh, just somebody who will bow to me once I take over the world!" the Brain laughed. The two lab mice were going to their trailer.

"Wow, for once one of my adventures ends up being somewhat happy," the Critic said to himself.

"Who cares," Slappy Squirrel said, walking past him.

It was then that digital arrows appeared in front of the Nostalgia Critic.

"FOLLOW THEM TO REACH BEGINNING OF CASE," the CPU voice spoke up.

"Fine," the Critic frowned, "You know you're a real buzz kill, right?" The voice did not respond to that comment.

…

The Critic followed the arrows until he got into the studio's dressing rooms. "So what's the big mystery?" he asked, hoping the voice would reply, but he got no response this time.

But that wasn't to say he wasn't given an answer. All of a sudden, a loud smashing was heard.

"The hell was that?!" the Critic exclaimed. From the vibrations he sensed on the floor, he looked toward one particular room.

Ralph, the bumbling guard at the studio, walked out of a room, rubbing his head. He had clearly been hurt in some fashion.

"Hey Ralph, what happened?" the Warner Brothers Yakko and Wakko, and the Warner Sister Dot asked.

"Duh, I went in my room to take my on shift nap, and when I woke up the whole room was trashed!" the security guard replied in a poor attempt to not make his performance look bad.

"Great," Yakko frowned, "We were really hoping the mini-choco bites would have been still in good condition."

The Nostalgia Critic looked around, honestly disappointed. "So this is the big caper you wanted me to solve?" he asked, looking straight up, "How did this end up just being figure out how a break room got messed up? What a letdown…." He sighed.

The Critic had to admit he had no other options at the moment, and, reluctantly, decided to take up the case.

….

Yakko, Wakko, and Dot were looking at the destruction in the break room. Mirrors were shattered, a couch had fallen to pieces, and a ceiling fan had fallen to the ground.

"Eh, we've done worse," Dot said, putting a sledgehammer into her back pocket.

"So it was you, right?" the Critic suddenly spoke up, "You smashed this place up with the hammer. There! Easiest mystery ever."

After a comedic timed beat, Dot began to laugh crazily. "Wow, that's golden," the Warden sister chuckled, "I only use this on people, not possessions."

"Damn," the Critic frowned.

"Hey, you're not allowed to curse!" Slappy exclaimed, walking into the break room with her purse.

"Oh yeah, rules of this world," the Critic realized. The NC realized that, indeed, solving the mystery would be his only way out of this world.

"Anything I can assist with?" Slappy asked the Warner siblings, "Skippy gave me superglue from his last art project."

"Not really," Yakko pointed out, "When you're as powerful as we are, we don't need to do this kind of work ourselves."

The Critic snooped around the room for clues. "There has to be something here…" he told himself.

"Would you mind leaving, random stranger?" Dot asked the Critic, resorting to her "Cute" face.

The Critic, having watched Animaniacs as a good knew that that face was one of the hardest things to say no to.

"Ah, you know what," the Critic smiled, "Sure." He then proceeded to walk out of the break room. Though, before that he did see that on the ceiling were some weird marks.

Outside, the Critic had to plan his next move. "Ok, I actually need to look at this like a mystery and not some poorly written thriller. So, next stop is to question the victim."

….

Ralph the guard was found by the critic sleeping on his post. The Critic knocked on the door.

"Hey, wake up bud!" he called loudly.

"Wha, wha?" Ralph gasped, waking up and spilling his coffee. "Who are you?"

"I'm the Nostalgia Critic, I remember it so you don't have to," the Critic explained, "And I'm here to ask you some questions."

"Like what?" Ralph asked.

"Do you remember what was the last thing you saw before the room got all smashed up?" the Critic asked.

Ralph paused for about a minute to think on that one. "Well…" he began to recap, "I woke up from my nap, and I put my gum on the table next to me. The next thing I knew there was loud noises everywhere, and the next thing I knew was that the whole place was messed up."

"So someone managed to ruin the break room in the blink of an eye?" the Critic replied. Thinking back to the scene of the crime, he recalled how there didn't appear to be any signs of fire or an explosion, so the damage had to have been caused manually.

Ralph blinked his eyes to check if that theory had validity. "They must've been really fast," he said.

"I'll just be leaving now," the Critic said, turning to where he felt the prime suspect of the case would be at.

…..

It didn't take much time for the Critic to come across ACME labs.

"You really have to admire what they managed to fit all in one studio," the Critic complimented. Walking inside the lab, he knew the Brain would be scheming to somehow take over the world again. This was routine, nothing to worry about.

"The freeze ray is almost complete Pinky!" the Brain laughed to his assistant (as well as arguably his friend).

"Does that mean we get frozen drinks at the restaurants, Brain?" Pinky asked the smart lab mouse.

"No, it means we can use this to take over the world!" Brain laughed.

"Say, sorry to interrupt," the Critic suddenly spoke up, "But where were you when the studio's break room got all smashed up?" he questioned.

"We were in this establishment, constructing the final pieces of my death ray," the Brain replied nonchalantly.

The Critic turned towards Pinky to confirm if this was true.

"Yup," Pinky nodded happily. The Critic knew that Pinky wasn't a good liar whenever he attempted to do so, and since this wasn't a lie, the Critic was able to accept that this alibi was legit.

"Well, I'll just leave you two to your world domination plans," the Critic said politely, having been a fan of the show. He left to continue the investigation.

"That was a nice man, Brain," Pinky smiled.

"When we take over the world we won't detonate his house," the Brain nodded.

…

While walking through the studio lot, the Critic ran into Rita and Runt.

Rita had been involved in the Holbrook case long ago, though the case this VR realm was based on happened before that.

"Cmon Runt, we need to get to the set soon," Rita smiled.

"Oh definitely, definitely Rita," Runt nodded. Runt still never could figure out that Rita was not a dog.

"Say, did you see any suspicious figures?" the Critic asked randomly.

"No, why do you ask?" Rita asked, the girl cat licking her paw.

"I'm trying to solve a mystery to get out of this world," the Critic explained, preferring to be blunt and avoiding the idea of trying to keep it all secret.

"Nope," Rita replied, making the "cuckoo" gesture with her paw.

"Ok then," Critic nodded, heading back to the break room, where the case all started.

…..

"The million dollar question is how did the perp mess up the room?" the Critic asked himself, "If Ralph's testimony is accurate, "They managed to mess up this place without even being inside the room. Whatever the answer is, I doubt it's a lame M. Night twist, for once."

The Nostalgia Critic went over to the fallen couch. "Let's see if there's anything here," he told himself.

Looking closely at the bottom of the feet of the couch, the Critic noticed something odd. There was some kind of substance along the bottom, something sticky.

"Ew…." The Critic gagged, but he was pleased to realize it wasn't any kind of disgusting substance.

Slowly but surely, the Nostalgia Critic began to develop a theory of what had happened in the room. The catch was, however, that he did not have any proof. He had a suspect pegged, but there wasn't any proof that the crime happened the way he had deduced.

But, then, he managed to come across his smoking gun.

The Critic felt something fall onto his hat. Feeling for it, he looked at it and realized "This is chewing gum," he commented.

He gained a smirk, "Gotcha now," the Critic chuckled.

…

The Nostalgia Critic made his way to where he knew the culprit would be.

"All right, come on out, I know it was you," he said to the toon inside the trailer.

"What do you want?" Slappy Squirrel asked, stepping outside.

"I know you were the one who destroyed the break room," the Critic accused the old squirrel.

"Are you nuts? No pun intended…" Slappy replied.

"Only after a really really bad movie," the Critic replied.

"How could I have done something like that?" Slappy asked, "It's not my style," she pointed out.

"You used something I saw you with," the Critic replied, "The Superglue. Here's what happened: Earlier in the day, Ralph went into the break room to take a nap. You were waiting inside. You either knocked him out or waited till he was deep asleep, then you wrapped the blanket around him. Then you superglued the couch to the ceiling of the room. That's what caused those marks on the ceiling. Since he didn't role in his sleep, your plan was set."

"Really?" Slappy smirked, "How do you know?"

"I found marks of the superglue on the couch's legs," the Critic explained to Slappy, "But that wasn't the biggest clue, either. The biggest clue was Ralph's chewing gum."

"Huh?" Slappy frowned.

"Ralph said when he woke up, he put his gum on the table next to him. But it fell from the ceiling onto my hat," the Critic cornered the culprit in the case, "Which means before his weight and movements caused him to fall, he put the gum there."

"All right, ya got me," Slappy said, "I did it just because I could," she laughed proudly.

Just then, the computerized voice finally returned. "CASE SOLVED. DE-DIGITALIZATION COMMENCING."

"What the?" the Critic asked as he vanished from the VR world.

….

Double D and Mantis were still waiting by their car.

"This is taking too long," Mantis told his human friend, "We need to get to city hall now. We should just keep running, and if Twilight comes back, we'll probably catch her halfway."

"I understand," Double D nodded. Mantis was quite quick despite his size, and had a lead over Double D.

"But there's one thing I can't figure out," Double D told the scientist/kung fu master.

"What's that?" Mantis asked.

"I can't possibly pinpoint a motive," Double D replied, "Why would anyone do this? It would be one thing to try to delay us if this was some other company who wanted to try linking with the real world, I could see them trying to sabotage us during production, but why wait until the unveiling night? What is this person or people trying to prove?" he asked.

"I don't know," Mantis nodded, admittedly, "But whatever it is, we know that something's going on, and it can't possibly be good," he frowned.

The human and mantis kept going towards Toon Town.

…..

Sly, Carmelita, Judith, KW, Rabbit, and Fox all went through the portal from Wild Thing Island to Thorn Valley.

"What's so significant about us being on this case?" Fox asked.

"We have heard about your past investigations officers," Carmelita replied, "So we knew you had connections to what was found back at the Holbrook incident."

"Then show us," Rabbit encouraged the Interpol officers.

"This picture was left at the near the mayor's body," Sly said, pulling a photo out of his jacket. On the photo was a lion.

"No way…" Fox gasped. It was a lion they had known from the past.

On that picture was Hartwell.


	6. The Fire Up Above

**The Toon Files Episode 97: The Fire Up Above.**

"Hartwell?" Rabbit gasped, "Why would his picture be there?!"

"He was the killer of the junkyard prison massacre," Sly nodded, "Which you two were involved in."

"It was our first big case and what inspired us to be cops," Fox nodded, "Hartwell, last name Bant, he went crazy because of bad therapy he had received and almost killed all of his friends because of an obsession with happiness, as he called it."

"You don't think he's actually not dead, do you?" Carmelita asked.

"No, no," Rabbit said as they went to the main hall of the Thorn Valley community, where Mr. Ages and Auntie Shrew were waiting, "Unlike Tyrus, some of us went back to the junkyard after the fires died down. Hartwell is definitely dead."

"Then why?" Fox asked, as the smaller rodents came up to the 6.

"Are you the agents Interpol sent?" Mr. Ages asked.

"We are indeed," Carmelita nodded.

"Thank goodness," Mrs. Shrew sighed, wiping sweat off of her brow, "Especially since there has been that bomb threat."

"Bomb threat?" Carmelita gasped, "This must be the actions of some extremists."

"I'm starting to feel these may all be separate incidents," Sly told his girlfriend, "The targets all have been radically different, and the DNA traces that have been uncovered are all different."

"Whatever the case may be," Rabbit said, "We need to protect these civilians."

"Can I eat these guys?" Judith asked hopefully, "They're small."

"No Judith," KW replied, putting her paw over her face in embarrassment.

…..

Back in the real world, the remaining internet critics would did not make it inside the virtual reality pods were looking on in shock at what was happening to their fellow reviewers.

"Oh no, Lupa!" Todd in the Shadows panicked, "I'll save you Lupa!" He went to try to break the pod open, but it only gave him an electric shock, knocking him backwards.

He then attempted the same thing again, with the exact same results.

"We have to keep calm and work a plan out," Marzgurl said, taking charge, "So Joe, I'm afraid we can't just shoot these things open."

"Dang," the Xbox game reviewer frowned.

"I'll see if I can hack these things," Linkara told his friends. He pressed a button on his communicator watch, "Pollo, see if you can link me to the security files on these pods."

"Yes," Linkara's robot buddy replied.

At this time, the second of the Virtual Reality cases was beginning.

….

**Paris, France, 1490.**

Paw Dugan, the site's musical movie critic was warped into the VR recreation of the Hunchback of Notre Dame world.

"Is this old time Paris?" Paw smiled, "Ah yes, this is by one of Disney's most musical masterpieces. Except for those accursed gargoyles…" he growled, baring his teeth.

It was then that Quasimodo, the aforementioned Hunchback was walking through the streets. Initially living his life in isolation because of the evil Judge Claude Frollo, he soon saw that the world would not judge him for his looks, and that the people of Paris genuinely cared for him. A digital arrow was pointed over his head.

"FOLLOW TO BEGIN CASE," the computerized voice said.

"All right," Paw sighed to himself, "I'll dismantle those terrible gargoyles later…."

Paw quickly went over to catch up with Quasimodo. "Hello there," Paw said.

"Why hello," Quasimodo replied, "Are you new in Paris?"

"You could say that," Paw replied, "Where are you headed?"

"To visit a new friend of mine," Quasimodo said, "He's something of an architect."

"Ah yes, Paris was….is well known for that," Paw quickly corrected.

….

At a building several floors tall, it was quite a then-modern marvel.

"Why hello there," Pierre, a man wearing mostly black smiled to the hunchback, "So I have more guests than expected," he added in reference to Paw.

Pierre's mansion was quite fancy, he had a lift that went between floors, a room for painting, and a man-made canal that went from room to room.

"I'm Paw," Paw introduced.

"Then you should meet my colleagues," Pierre smiled. Two women and 1 man stepped out from side rooms.

"I'm Marie," the shorter of the two girls said, "I am the one who enjoys painting."

"I'm Chantelle," the taller girl introduced, "I am the work who designs those lifts. They're the fruits of my labor."

"I am Benjamin," the other man said, "I'm good with modeling. You see this boats I've constructed?" he grinned, showing Paw and Quasimodo some of his small boats, "I test them in the mini canals here. I have 12 ones in my collection."

"Interesting," Paw said, preferring to see the magnificent sight of the Cathedral.

"I'm going to take a rest after my hard work," Pierre yawned, "I'll awaken later tonight."

As Quasimodo and Paw prepared to leave, Paw smelt a strong smell. "They had scented candles back then?" the internet critic asked himself.

….

After walking through the Parisian marketplace for a bit, Quasimodo saw something odd. "There's smoke rising," the hunchback pointed.

Looking up, Paw realized what the case was. "That's the house we were just at!" Paw exclaimed.

"My friends might be in danger, let's go!" Quasimodo called, using ropes to swing and get ahead faster.

By the time that he and Paw arrived, Benjamin, Marie, and Chantelle were running out of the building.

"The top floor's on fire!" Chantelle exclaimed.

"Pierre's up there!" Benjamin coughed.

Quasimodo looked on in horror as the top floors burned.

Eventually, the snow falling plus the work of Paw and the others managed to extinguish the blaze, but when Quasimodo examined Pierre's body, it was already too late.

"No…." he cried, pounding the floor with his fist in anger, "How could something like this happen?!"

Paw was about to express some form of sorrow (he knew, after all, that this world was only virtual reality), when he remembered that the point of this world was to solve a mystery.

"And with any good mystery, the obvious answer is not the correct one," Paw said to himself.

"What do you mean mystery?" Quasimodo asked.

"I'll get back to you on that," Paw replied, heading upstairs to the burned out rooms.

….

While the lower levels managed to make it out unscathed, the upper floors of the building were pretty much toast.

"Geez, this is even worse than a forum after an internet flame war," the musical movie critic said at the sight of the damage, even though he knew he technically wasn't real.

"The flames must have started up here," Paw said, looking for clues.

As the critic looked around the scene of the incident, he was impressed to see that, although it had been char damaged, most of the work of Pierre's colleagues matched what they had claimed.

One of the walls that managed to stay mostly in tact had one of Marie's paintings. Fittingly enough, it was of the Notre Dame Cathedral.

More of the mini-waterways that Benjamin had built were going around the edges of the rooms. "Neat," Paw commented, checking them out. The water had evaporated due to the earlier fire.

What looked like a hole in the wall was actually a lift that Chantelle had constructed. "Man, Disney knows how to make things look good," he said, impressed.

As he prepared to go back downstairs, Paw's shoe bumped into a small object on the ground.

"What's this?" Paw asked. It was a small square, not appearing to have been a piece of debris or anything like that. He decided to pocket it as he went downstairs to continue the investigation.

…..

"So? What did you find, Paw?" Quasimodo asked as Paw came downstairs.

"I was just checking out the immediate scene," Paw replied, "And I think it's a good starting point for my investigation."

"Investigation?" Chantelle asked.

"This was all just a tragic accident," Benjamin added.

"Is it?" Paw replied in question, beginning to go into deep insightful mode, "Fire is something usually used to symbolize rage. And what might one do in a fit of rage? Why, take someone else's life of course. And don't the circumstances seem a little too convenient? A fire breaks out, yet Pierre is the only one who dies while all of you walk out unharmed? It's all a little too elementary," he said. All Paw was missing was a pipe at the moment to complete the mood.

"That's ludicrous," Marie replied, offended, "How can you even begin to think to accuse us of killing Pierre? He's the reason all of us owe our successes."

"Now, I've heard of enough incidents to know that lack of apparent motivation does not mean that one is fully innocent," Paw replied.

Quasimodo slowly began to look angrily at Marie, Chantelle, and Benjamin. He had learned from his experiences with Frollo that sometimes, the people who do the most heinous of actions are the ones who appear to be the most innocent.

"I highly recommend you three stay here," Quasimodo advised sternly, "I wouldn't want any potential criminals to try to get away…."

"Constable, keep the area around this house secure," Paw advised.

"Yes sir," the enforcer of the law nodded.

"Time to begin the interrogations," Paw smirked.

…

Paw and Quasimodo teamed up to interrogate the three possible suspects.

"So then," Paw began to Benjamin, "Where were you at the time the fire began?"

"I was right outside the building actually," Benjamin explained, "I wanted to tend to Pierre's garden. He really cares about his flowers."

"Any witnesses to attest to this?" Paw asked.

"Marie did get a little glimpse of me," Benjamin admitted, "But she can tell you I never went upstairs."

"An architect does have a taste for the beautiful," Paw nodded, "You can call in the next suspect."

…..

Marie was the next to be interrogated by the internet critic, and she was giving her alibi.

"I had to focus completely on my newest painting," she informed Paw, "The sun was in just the right position to get the combination of colors that would make this piece my magnum opus."

"Ah, the sun shining down on Paris," Paw smiled, agreeing at the ability to appreciate the beauty of such a site.

"So, you have no grounds to accuse me on," Marie frowned, "And can't you show a little more class newcomer?" she growled towards Paw.

She went over to the wall and hit it angrily to let out her frustrations.

This had the side effect of knocking Benjamin's model boats off the wall. Being a good Samaritan, Paw picked up all 11 and put them back on the shelf.

"Anyone saw you paint?" Quasimodo asked.

"Chantelle did," Marie replied, "And I think she was busy too, last I saw before the fire."

….

And lastly, Chantelle was interrogated.

"You're insane, newcomer," she scolded.

"Now let's not make conclusions just yet," Paw replied, hating to be assertive in this manner, but it was his only way out of this VR world. "Where were you at the time the fire started?"

"I was coming up with plans for the next design of my lift," Chantelle explained to the two males, "I want to be able to expand my talents, so I figured I can't stick to one design forever."

"Any witnesses?" Paw had to ask one last time.

"Marie saw me," Chantelle nodded, "She can back this story up."

….

Now, Paw had to look for any important clues.

"Come on, come on, there has to be something around here somewhere," he mumbled to himself.

It was then that he noticed that weird smell from before. Actually, it was something different.

"Wait, what the hell is this smell?" Paw asked, looking for the source. What he found was a sort of container.

"Is this kerosene?" Paw asked surprised, "Ok, this is pretty out of place in old time Paris," he had to admit.

He stood there, seeing some matches lying on the ground.

"Well, this is one less mystery on my hands," Paw told himself. Suddenly, he paused.

"One less…." He repeated to himself.

A confident grin then appeared on Paw's face. "It seems everything is beginning to unravel," he laughed.

…..

Paw returned to the rooms where Quasimodo, Chantelle, Benjamin, and Marie were at.

"What is with that smirk?" Marie asked the internet critic.

"Through deductive reasoning, I've been able to determine the identity of the arsonist!" Paw revealed in a dramatic tone.

"You know who killed Pierre?" Quasimodo asked, surprised.

"Indeed I did," Paw nodded, "And I can tell you all now. It was none other than you….Benjamin!"

"What?!" Benjamin gasped, "How dare you even think of saying that?!"

"I can back up those claims," Paw replied, "I know how you managed to set the upstairs on fire without ever going up there."

"How'd he do something like that?" Marie asked.

"He made us of his talents," Paw replied, beginning his summation, "Namely his boat modeling, and the waterways he constructed in this house."

"Huh?" Benjamin frowned.

"You took one of your model boats. You rigged a small hole in the bottom. Earlier, you had gone upstairs and filled some of those waterways with kerosene," Paw explained.

"Kerosene?" Chantelle gasped.

"Yup, a very flammable substance," Paw nodded in response, "I also found some matches lying on the ground in another part of the house. You lit the match and placed it in the boat, which you sent to go upstairs, rigged to drop the match at a scheduled time."

"Superfluous nonsense," Benjamin retorted in his defense.

"Is it?" Paw replied, "You went out to the garden to give yourself an alibi, and you waited until the fire had been started. Pierre was asleep, he'd make an easy kill. And when I was looking upstairs, I found this," he added, pulling out the square, "This was to ensure the match would go into the kerosene. That's also what those scented candles were for-to hide the scent."

"But where's your proof?" Benjamin gasped, running out of defenses.

"How many boats are on your wall?" Paw asked.

"That's easy," Benjamin laughed, "There's….12…"

"Really? I only see 11," Paw smirked in reply, cracking the case.

"How could you?!" Quasimodo yelled at the murderer. "How could you do such an evil thing?!"

"How could I do a bad thing?" Benjamin replied, "How could Pierre do such an underhanded thing to me?"

"What do you mean?" Marie asked.

"He ripped off my designs and sold them off as his own," Benjamin revealed, "And he laughed in my face when I confronted him about it."

The case had been solved. Before Paw could turn to go to the cathedral, the digital voice returned.

"CASE HAS BEEN CONCLUDED" the voice said, as it began to talk Paw out of his VR world.

"But I didn't get a chance to knock off the gargoyles," Paw grumbled before he vanished.

…

Jimmy, Francis, and the others were looking on in concern as the devices that were the portals between their realm and the real world continued to mysteriously malfunction.

"What can we do?" Francis asked.

"Let's try forcing them open!" Po called, he, Tai Lung, and Tigress jumping onto the stage, "The people from the real world are trapped inside!"

It was then that some exhausted breaths and some hurrying hoof steps were heard.

"Wait…" Twilight panted, almost passing out on the spot, "You can't do that…."

"Twilight?" Frylock, Jimmy, and Francis asked, "What took you so long? And why do you look so tired?"

"It's not a happy story…." The purple horse replied.

…..

Back in Thorn Valley, the 4 cops and the two Wild Things were patrolling the grounds.

"Nothing suspicious spotted," Rabbit said into his walkie talkie.

Fox and KW had to keep Judith from trying to eat the local animals.

"This is embarrassing," KW apologized to Fox.

Sly was walking around the outside of the village, chewing on a stick of gum, when he noticed some unusual foot prints on the ground.

"What the?" the thieving raccoon turned Interpol agent asked himself, "These look like….red panda tracks….."

And then it happened.

BOOM! A massive explosion went off behind Sly, burning up a lot of Thorn Valley.

"There's been an attack!" Rabbit and Fox called over their talkies.

"Don't let anyone escape!" Carmelita advised her boyfriend and allies.

Another tragedy has just happened.


	7. Greek Tragedy

**The Toon Files Episode 98: Greek Tragedy.**

The two foxes, rabbit, and raccoon came running to each other, trying to pick up any of the mice/rats to save them from the place.

"We were too late!" Fox frowned, seeing the chaos all around them.

Luckily, Mrs. Brisby's teenage children-Martin, Timothy, and Cynthia were able to escape the flames.

"What the hell happened?" Martin exclaimed, running into Rabbit's paw.

"Those threatening messages were legit, weren't they?" Cynthia yelled.

"Yes…." Sly nodded regretfully.

"Then this isn't a matter for just the police anymore!" Mr. Ages said, "This isn't the work of petty thugs, someone is trying to kill us all!" Sadly, Mrs. Shrew had been killed in the explosion.

"And I may have an idea who…." Sly told his friends and girlfriend.

"What do you mean Constable?" Fox asked.

"I saw suspicious tracks right outside the village before the bombing," Sly explained to the others, "Red panda tracks to be precise."

"The only red panda in any of the worlds I can think of is…." Rabbit said, beginning to realize the answer.

"Shifu," Carmelita completed, "I think it's time we pay a visit to China, and we better hurry!"

…..

The detectives from the TDC informed Twilight at what had been happening since they had left the complex.

"This is so friggen bad," Twilight gulped, temporarily losing her ability to stick with proper grammar, "This isn't how this was supposed to go at all."

"What do you mean?" Shizuku asked the pony, "Wasn't this supposed to be used to go between worlds?"

"Not in this fashion," Twilight replied, "There weren't supposed to be people from the real world coming here, it was supposed to be some of us going into the real world!"

"What?!" Seiji gasped, "Then what are these people doing in there?"

"Someone must've tampered with the experiment," Francis deduced, "Someone found out about the plans for these pods, Double D said they had tested this before, right?"

"Yeah," Twilight nodded, "We've been able to send small objects into the real world. And also, we were able to control where the objects appeared."

"So, someone must've broken in and used the technology to send something to the real world that would get people into the pods on the real world side," Jimmy figured, "But why?"

…

Across Toon Town, at the police station, some of the officers were ending their shifts.

"See you tomorrow Sonic," Sully called. The blue monster and hedgehog both had taken an interest in police work over the past decade.

"Yeah, see ya," Sonic nodded in reply. As he was heading through the locker rooms, the super-fast hedgehog noticed something sticking out of Fox's locker. It was a picture.

"Huh, is this one of "those" photos she likes to give to Rabbit?" Sonic smirked, grabbing it. But it wasn't a picture of Fox.

It was a picture of Terk, the gorilla, who, around 11 years ago, was behind the Ghostface massacre that terrorized Toon Town.

"What the?" Sonic asked, confused.

….

**Athens, Greece, 654 BC.**

The next one of the crew to arrive in a VR recreation of a case was the Nostalgia Chick. When she digitized into the world, she quickly realized where she was.

"Oh, I'm in Hercules?" the Chick groaned. The film was a guilty pleasure for her, though there were other VR realms she'd have hoped to end up in.

"At least it wasn't Song of the South, I'll give it that," the Nostalgia Chick said, when she suddenly saw Hades, god of the underworld, talking to his two minions, Pain and Panic, basically hell imps.

"So, the big show's tonight and alas I can't make it," Hades said with a smirk, "So I'm hoping you can to lighten things up for Zues-y," he laughed.

"Yeah, we can do that," Panic nodded, "We'll be sure to tell you all about it, boss!"

"Count on us!" Pain added.

"Yeah, sure I can," Hades replied, his tone of voice filled with doubt.

"You make me laugh," the Chick said about Hercules.

"FOLLOW ARROWS TO REACH MYSTERY," the electronic voice said to the Nostalgia Chick, being the only one who could hear it.

Digital arrows appeared, pointing her towards the nearby theater.

"I might as well so I can cover a mystery movie on my next episode," the Chick said.

…

Outside were Hercules, and his two friends, Icarus and Cassandra.

"I sense that the show will be delayed," Cassandra said, putting her hands to her forehead to get her vision.

"No way," Icarus smiled in reply, the young inventor was ever the optimist.

Just then, Adonis, one of their fellow students and somewhat of an egomaniac came up to them.

"We might have a shortage of tickets we can sell," he informed.

"See?" Cassandra snarked.

"I'm just glad my god parents can make it to the performance," Hercules said, being a demi-god who had been raised by human parents.

The digital arrows kept pointing to the theater. The Nostalgia Chick just wanted to get the situation she was trapped in over with, so she barely acknowledged the young Olympian students.

"Yeah yeah, these characters will probably end up being the suspects," she said before the electronic voice could provide her the general info needed to solve the case.

"I am sensing that something wrong will happen during the play," Cassandra told the others as they walked into the arena.

…

The play was a production of Zeus' battle with the monster Typhon. Icarus's father was providing special effects with his technology.

Now, ancient Greek theater was unlike modern theater in that, sometimes the stages were complete circles, with seats surrounding them from every angle.

Zeus, the lead god of Mt. Olympus and his wife Hera were sitting in special VIP seats above the rest of the crowd.

Modified tomatoes were used to represent lightning bolts.

"You are beaten, foul titan!" Hercules acted, playing Zues in the production. He was sure everything was going to go well, when all of a sudden….

SPLAT. A few stray tomatoes fired out from under the stage, and hit Zeus directly on the face.

"Oh no…." Hercules frowned, seeing an angry grin appear in Zeus's eye.

"Who did this?" the god of thunder demanded to know to the crowd watching the play.

"I don't know," Hercules replied, "Icarus, did something go wrong with your dad's invention?"

"Nothing went wrong," Icarus replied, "My dadicus's machines never malfunction."

"Someone must pay for who did this to me!" Zeus announced.

"Calm down dear, this is embarrassing," Hera groaned, covering her face.

…

"This is where I step in, I guess," the Nostalgia Chick said suddenly, appearing by the leader of the gods.

"Who are you?" Zeus asked, puzzled by the mortal girl.

"I am….Nostalgia," the Chick said, knowing it was pointless to try to explain the internet to them.

"And what are you doing here, Nostalgia?" Hera questioned.

"It's a very long story, but for reasons I'm not going into I've been chosen to solve this lackluster mystery that was probably thought of by a sub-par writer."

"What do you mean thought of?" Cassandra asked.

"Look, ignore that comment," the Chick replied, "Point is, I'm going to take valuable time out of my day to find who out launched some tomatoes into your face Zeus."

"I predict this is going to be awkward," Cassandra commented, her hands on her forehead again, sensing the future.

"You got that right," the Chick replied. "So anyway, overly manic and whiny boy, what was that launcher programmed to do?"

"Hey," Icarus replied, offended, "I'm pouty, not whiny," he said in his defense, "And my dadicus's device was put under the stage and rigged to fire tomatoes at timed intervals in set directions."

"So someone tampered with the device," the Chick determined easily, "Who had access to it?"

"Well, there's me and my dad," Icarus replied, "As well as my pal Herc here."

"Do you really think I would do something like this?" Hercules responded to the internet critic, "Zeus is my father, and besides, he's much much more stronger than me. Would I really want to tick him off?"

"Ok, I'll give you that," the Chick replied to the demi-god, "But as much as I want to be, I'm not done here yet."

"This day has been such an inconvenience," Hera sighed, "We're provided tickets to the Northern VIP seats for the gods, and now the whole production is ruined."

"Don't be blaming yourself," Zeus replied to his wife, "It's not your fault. And this Nostalgia person is going to find out who the culprit is or else I'll send some lightning bolts her way!"

"I've dealt with quasi-demonic forces of evil," the Chick smirked in reply "You can't really startle me with threats like that."

"Just solve the mystery please," Hercules requested, "This day has just gone downhill."

"Sure, I guess," the Chick shrugged. She went outside to look for more clues.

….

The virtual reality recreation of Ancient Greece did match up to the art style of the movie, the Nostalgia Chick had to admit.

"Ok next step in cliché mystery stories is questioning witnesses," she said to herself. As she was walking along she noticed several weird things surrounding the outside of the theater. There were several square sections of ground where it looked like objects had once been standing there but had since been moved.

"Make a mental note of that," the Chick thought to herself as she saw a lot of Greece residents walking around, looking confused about something.

"What's with all the commotion?" Adonis asked the Chick. The Nostalgia Chick wasn't fond of the tv series based on the show, and she didn't care for his character.

"Some random moron hit Zeus with tomatoes," the Chick explained, "Can I ask where you were any hour ago?"

"I was taking care of my hair," Adonis replied to the Chick, "This is something that needs to be kept in tip-top shape."

"Why did I expect any other kind of reply?" the Chick sighed to herself, taking a few steps away. "Now, I have to go take care of solving some lame caper, I don't need your one-dimensionalness right now."

…

Not too far from the arena, Pain and Panic were looking around for the right moment and place to strike.

"This is taking too long," Pain, the smaller fat imp frowned, "The boss is gonna be ticked at us."

"Just quit your whining," Panic, the blue and taller of the two imps replied, "Your pessimism isn't going to get us anywhere."

It did not take a long period of time for the Nostalgia Chick to discover the minions of Hades.

"All right you two," the Chick spoke up in a sardonic tone, picking both of the imps up by the scruff of their necks, "Just come out and admit it."

"Admit to what, your scariness?" Pain and Panic shivered.

"That you honestly thought it would be an effective revenge scheme to just rig a machine to launch mere tomatoes at Zeus, which, at worst, would be a minor annoyance."

"Launch tomatoes?" Pain replied, confused.

"It was obviously you two, I overheard you," the Chick retorted.

"Even we're not that lazy and pathetic," Panic said, surprising himself as well as the internet critic.

"We were gonna launch some dark souls at him, but we couldn't find the way to his seats," Pain continued, "We've been walking around for over an hour now."

"I see," the Chick nodded, disappointed the answer was not as obvious as she had hoped. "I won't be keeping in touch," she informed in a tone that intimidated the minions of Hades.

…

The Nostalgia Chick went back into the theater, focusing on a different question in her mind.

"Then who was the one who tampered with the machine, and how?" the Chick thought to herself. She was about to get her answer, however.

"No one could have messed with my dadicus's device," Icarus repeated, "He set everything to fire right on time, in the right directions to boot."

"Have you been flying too close to the sun again?" Cassandra snarked.

It was then that the answer struck the Nostalgia Chick like a bolt.

"I got it," she said suddenly.

…..

"You got what? Tell me, Nostalgia," Zeus demanded of the internet critic known for an analytical approach.

"I know who caused this whole dumb mess," the Chick revealed to the Greeks.

"Tell us who it was," Cassandra encouraged, putting her hands to her forehead, "I foresee this will probably not go well."

"Indeed," the Chick nodded, "Because the culprit happens to be none other than you, Cassandra."

"What?" Hercules gasped, "Cassandra did this? Are you joking?"

"I'm more into anti-humor," the Chick replied, "But no, I'm not."

"How could it have been her?" Icarus asked, "She may be my friend but I didn't give her access to the area below the stage."

"That's exactly the point," the Nostalgia Chick replied, "She knew she couldn't rig the machine in any way, so she decided to tamper with the theater around us."

"How could I have done that?" Cassandra asked.

"By moving all the signs around this place that indicated direction," the Chick explained, "Outside the theater, I noticed some marks on the ground where it look like things had been moved. After talking with Pain and Panic I figured out what it had to have been."

"What was it?" Hera asked.

"The signs saying which seats were where," the Chick revealed, "She knew about the staging, and that Zeus and Hera received tickets to a specific side of VIP seats. For a master of seeing the future, you messed with everyone's minds. Once the gods were in their seats, Hercules just assumed that where his parents were was the Northern direction."

"Quite an interesting trick," Hercules had to admit.

"But where's your proof that I began this whole mess?" Cassandra asked.

"My proof is a simple slip-up you made," the Chick said, confident but not smirking.

"What slip-up?" Cassandra asked.

"You have to touch your forehead when you get your predictions," the Chick explained, "When you predicted things would go wrong, I saw that you didn't."

"I see," Cassandra nodded, essentially confessing to her guilt.

"Why would you do this?" Zeus asked his son's friend, restraining his anger.

"To show you once and for all that that launcher was a bad idea," Cassandra said to Icarus.

"No it isn't," Icarus replied in a headstrong tone, "It's the next big thing!"

The Nostalgia Chick began to digitally vanish out of the VR world. "Well, I'm out," she said rather calmly.

…

Sly, Carmelita, Fox, Rabbit, Judith, and KW were much quicker in their journey to the Valley of Peace.

"Did there have to be this many stairs?" Rabbit panted as the 6 of them were halfway up to the Jade Palace.

"Halt!" a feminine voice suddenly called. Slithering out in front of them was Viper, one of the Furious Five.

"Hello Ms. Viper," Fox bowed to the kung fu master.

"What are you doing here?" Crane asked, fluttering down to the group.

"We're here on a mission," Sly replied, wiping sweat off his brow.

"What kind of mission?" Monkey asked, walking down.

"We need to see Shifu, and now," Carmelita explained firmly, "Lifes may be at stake."

"What?!" the kung fu masters gasped.

…..

On the outskirts of Toon Town, Double D and Mantis had finally managed to make it into the city.

"At last…my pancreas is chafing," Double D panted, almost out of breath. He was never an athlete.

"There's one thing I still can't figure out," Mantis spoke up, having spent the ride on the human's back to ponder the situation.

"What's that?" Double D asked.

"We kept this project completely under wraps," Mantis replied, "No one outside of the complex was told about it. Yet if someone really is tampering with our device, they must've known just what to do."

"So what you're getting at is that whoever messed with the programming was someone at the complex?" Double D realized.

"Precisely," Mantis nodded, "But the million dollar question is why would anyone do this? What are they trying to accomplish?"

"I'll admit I have no answers to that," Double D replied, "But whatever the reason, it's our duty to stop this madness."


	8. Vehicular Carslaughter

**The Toon Files Episode 99: Vehicular Carslaughter.**

Monkey, Viper, and Crane led the law enforcers inside the Jade Palace.

"Ah, we have guests," Shifu smiled, the red panda and master of the palace walking towards them.

"Master Shifu," Rabbit spoke up first, "We have some very important matters we would like to discuss with you."

"Like can we eat you?" Judith grinned hopefully.

"No…." KW groaned, "Please excuse my friend here."

"What are these matters?" Shifu asked.

"We…we think you're a suspect in a recent bombing incident," Carmelita replied.

"A bombing?" Shifu gasped, horrified, "How could that be?"

"The cannon was recently invented in this world," Sly recalled, "You could use the powder to create some explosives."

"How dare you," Shifu growled, walking towards the raccoon angrily.

Carmelita pulled out her shock pistol to defend her boyfriend.

It was then Fox's cell phone rang. "Hello?" she asked, picking it up.

"Fox? It's Sonic," the hedgehog cop said over the phone.

"Now's not the time," Fox replied, prepared to hang up, when Sonic continued.

"Listen, I find a photo of…get this…Terk mysteriously lying around here at the station," Sonic informed.

"Terk? Really?" Fox said, surprised.

"Not only that, but someone took my cell door keys," Sonic continued.

"We can't leave now, I'm afraid," Fox replied, "We'll get back to Toon Town when we can."

Shifu, calming down, went into his private room.

"Now we play the waiting game," Sly smirked.

…..

Back at Toon Town City Hall, Twilight was figuring out what to do with the people from the real world who were trapped in the pods.

"Their minds are being projected into the VR recreations of old cases," Twilight figured, analyzing the monitors.

"Like the ones we watched when we were interns," Dawn nodded.

"Precisely," the purple pony nodded in reply.

"What can we do to get them out?" Abigail asked.

"It's too dangerous to try to force the pods open," Twilight explained, "At least until they each manage to escape the realms their minds were sent to. If we try to break them out prematurely, it will cause their minds to be lost forever."

"Damn," Francis frowned, the feline looking down in anger, "We're gonna have to hope all of those real world people are good with detective work."

"Because if they aren't, they may be lost," Jimmy nodded grimly. "We have to figure out who is behind this whole mess, there's no way this was just a random glitch gone wrong."

…

**Radiator Springs, Utah, 2011.**

The next one of the TGWTG crew to arrive in a VR world was Blockbuster Buster. In his case, however, his body was completely changed to fit the realm he was in.

"Where am I?" the Buster asked. When he moved forward, he realized he was rolling forward. He had been turned into a car! Specifically, a PT Cruiser.

"Oh great, I'm in Cars," the Buster frowned, "By far Pixar's weakest work." It was then that he saw the digital arrows appear over him.

"FOLLOW TO REACH LOCATION OF MYSTERY," the computer voice spoke up.

"Fine, you don't have to tell me to hurry to get this done," the Buster said.

As he drove his way towards the Radiator Springs Speedway where Lightning McQueen and some of his friends were hosting a charity race event, he passed by the tow truck Tow Mater.

"This'll be the best dang race in the town history," the tow truck chuckled happily. Mater was the Buster's least favorite character, so he quickly drove past.

Once he got to the raceway, the Blockbuster Buster was directed to the audience stands. "So what's the big caper?" he asked himself. That answer would come later.

…..

Though he was now quite humbled, Lightning was still a very skilled racer. He was zooming past all of the competition.

"Ka-chow," Lightning smirked to himself.

In the audience with the Buster was Fillmore the Volkswagen bus, and Sally Carrera, Lightning's girlfriend.

"It's nice how we also race so much money for the orphanages," Sally smiled.

The Buster just sat in his seat, waiting for the established mystery to start. All the while, he swore he could hear some kind of metallic thumping, but he figured it was just the seats shaking from the combined weight of all the cars in the audience.

….

30 minutes later, Lightning won the race. "All right, I win again!" he grinned in victory.

"Way to go," Sally smiled.

"I can't believe Mater's not here," Lightning noticed, "Usually, when I win, he's the one who likes to brag that I'm the best racer in the world."

"Yeah, where did Mater go?" Fillmore asked.

It wasn't until all the cars left the arena did they get the horrifying answer to that question.

In the center of town lay Mater, unmoving and somewhat broken. He was….dead!

"Mater? Buddy?!" Lightning gasped, zipping over to his friend. "Cmon, wake up, this joke isn't funny anymore…" But Mater could no longer reply.

"He's dead?" The Buster asked, surprised. "Saves me the effort of wanting it to happen," he said in his mind. However, BB instantly knew that this was the mystery he had to solve if he wanted out of this virtual reality world.

"Mater….no…" Sally said, shutting her eyes and looking away from the scene.

"Do you think he got into some kind of crash?" Fillmore asked, not wanting to see his friend's body either.

"No, that can't be," Lightning replied, "I know Mater well enough that I'm sure he would never drive recklessly."

"This is where I step in," the Blockbuster Buster said, driving up to the morning automobiles.

"Who are you?" Lightning asked the Buster.

"You can call me the Blockbuster Buster," he replied, "And I'm here to solve the mystery of who murdered Mater."

"You're a detective?" Sally asked the internet critic, "Oh thank goodness."

"The question is," the Buster began, "Where should be the first place I look?" Without any added comments, he decided to start off by examining the car corpse.

….

"This is pretty bad damage even by G-rated not even human or any kind of blood filled creature standards," the Buster had to admit.

Squinting and looking closely, he managed to see where Mater's mileage counter stood.

"What does it say?" Lightning asked BB.

"The count stands at 113,546 miles," the Buster read off, "What does that help with?"

"Mater is so obsessed with minor details like that," Fillmore explained, "He was actually fairly knowledgeable in some areas."

"Doesn't change the fact that Larry the Cable Guy ruins any movie by being the lead…or in it, period," the Buster thought.

"In fact, we heard him talking what his mileage was just before the charity race began," Guido added.

"And then, it was…." The Buster encouraged.

"It was the in the 113,490s," Lightning recalled.

"So about a 50 mile difference," the Buster concluded.

Sally then sighed in relief. "Well, that's comforting," she said.

"What do you mean?" the Blockbuster Buster asked.

"Mater's top speed is only about 50 miles per hour," Sally explained, "Once the charity race started, we were all in the seats at the raceway. I got a good look around, no one left during the race. For Mater's mileage to be like that, he would have to have been driving nonstop since the race began. That means whoever killed him wasn't one of us."

"I see," the Buster nodded in response. However, as a critic, he had seen enough mystery shows and movies to know that just because of group of people all had alibis, doesn't mean they should be ruled out as suspects.

"I'm just going to drive around and look for clues," he told the residents of Radiator Springs.

"Good luck," Fillmore said.

As the Buster headed back towards the raceway, he heard some weird jangling sound coming from Mater's friends.

…

The Blockbuster Buster drove back towards the racing track, where no one was currently still at.

"Ok, clues, clues," the Buster said to himself, looking around. He drove to the raceway's security office, where a camera had been installed.

"I'm sure Sally made a mistake, or else she's lying to protect herself or someone else," the Buster figured confidently, reaching out a tire to push the "Rewind Footage" button on the camera.

Going back a little over an hour, the camera was at just the right angle to show all of the cars in the stand and on the track.

The Buster paid careful attention to the video playback. He was looking for his smoking gun. He was hoping to see one of the audience members slip away while everyone was entranced by the race in front of them, or if not that, then one of the over three dozen racers who had blended in to the mass chaos that was the race decided to do a crafty maneuver and slip off the track without catching anyone's attention. This particular race was not televised, after all.

But he never saw anything like that. True, Lightning did do a victory lap and Fillmore was the first to leave the arena, but no one was out of sight at the estimated time of death.

"That's impossible!" the Blockbuster Buster gasped, the newest member of the TGWTG was surprised, "How can this be? This means that everyone in the town does have an airtight alibi."

The critic transformed into a PT cruiser knew he couldn't give up if he wanted out of this VR world, so he had to keep looking for any significant clues.

…

The Buster drove just outside the racing arena. As he was driving, he saw one particular side of the arena had something odd that the other parts did not have.

"Ah ha, what's this?" BB said to himself, seeing a section of the wall with a lot of dents in it. "These appear to have been made recently," he said, examining the scene.

But he still wasn't sure what they could mean. "It could be just some punk vandals wanting to pull a lame joke," he theorized.

Driving a few more feet forward, the Buster ended up bumping into something.

"Ow," he groaned, his front bumper getting a tiny dent in it, "A cinderblock?"

He looked around in annoyance, "What kind of moron leaves a cinderblock just standing up around like this?"

However the Buster knew to keep these findings in mind, in case they proved valuable to the case.

"I guess it's time to question the suspects," he said to himself.

….

Sally, Lightning, and Fillmore were waiting for the Blockbuster Buster to come back.

"Did you find out who killed Mater?" Fillmore asked hopefully as the detective internet critic.

"No, I'm afraid not," the Buster replied, "I have found some things, but nothing that point to who the culprit is. I'm going to have another look at the body."

"Go on ahead," Lightning encouraged, trying to adjust a loose wheel the Buster noticed he had.

"Something bothering you Fillmore?" Sally asked.

"Nothing big," Fillmore said, shaking about, "I think I got some kind of pebble caught in my mirror."

…

The Buster drove over to Mater's body and looked it over again. Though Mater was known for keeping his chain and ball in perfectly taut position, but now they had been changed to loose, and from some marks on the body, looked like they had been tossed about recently.

"Hm…." The Buster mumbled silently to himself, beginning to form a theory about what had happened. He looked down the road and saw that the spot Mater's body was found was a straight shot from the raceway. More specifically it was in a straight line from the section of wall that had all those dents.

"Could it be?" the Buster smirked to himself, getting a closer look at Mater. He needed one more piece of evidence and the case would be wrapped up.

Looking close at Mater's door and around his windows/eyes, the Buster saw some small, gray pebbles lying there that did not appear to be sand.

The Blockbuster Buster began to chuckle. "All right," he announced, "I've figured out who the killer is…."

…..

"You did?" Sally asked, in a mixture of joy and still more sorrow over Mater's death.

"Tell us," Lightning encouraged, "Who was the monster who killed my friend?!"

"The identity of the killer," the Buster began in a dramatic fashion, "Is none other than you…..Fillmore!"

"What? Me?" the Volkswagen van gasped, "You've gotta be kidding me. Now is not the time for jokes, stranger."

"For once in my career I'm not telling a joke," the Buster replied, "I know how you managed to kill Mater without being at the scene of the crime. All of you, I should tell you that the site of Mater's death is not where his body is standing right now."

"What?!" Sally and Lightning gasped.

"It was actually right outside the raceway," the Buster explained, "Sometime before the race Fillmore lured Mater to an area he had prepared with a cinderblock beforehand. He attacked Mater, then propped him up on the cinderblock. He put on another block to keep the gas pedal down so his wheels would role and raise Mater's mileage while Fillmore gets an alibi by being at the racetrack in the stands."

"That's simply preposterous," Fillmore replied.

"Is it?" the Buster responded, "During the race I heard a metallic clanging. Later when I found all those dents on the wall I realized it was Mater trying to call for help. That's why his chain was loose. The dents were caused by him hitting the wall with it. Once the race was over you knocked his body off and it rolled forward."

"Geez…." Lightning shivered, looking at the fan with contempt, "Why would you do this?"

"Where's your proof?" Fillmore replied in his own defense, "All I'm hearing is just guesswork. Where's your hard evidence?!"

"If it's hard proof you're looking for, you have it in your mirror, Fillmore," the Buster revealed.

Fillmore thought for a moment, and then he gasped. "In your mirror is a piece of the cinderblocks you used in your crime, and more fragments like that can be found on Mater. Now confess!"

"Dang it," Fillmore growled, out of cards to play, he was caught.

"Why Fillmore, why?" Lightning demanded to know.

"Because he made a mistake," Fillmore replied angrily, "He gave my mom a type of fuel he recommended when she really needed some. But it turns out it didn't mix well with her design and it made her hospitalized for the rest of her life. I just couldn't forgive him for that!"

"Ha," the Buster thought, "I knew that guy would just mess things up." It was at this moment that since his mystery had been solved, the Blockbuster Buster began to digitally vanish out of the VR realm. "Finally," he sighed, relieved.

…..

Back in the real world, the remaining critics of were still thinking of plans of how to free their friends.

"I'll get on my Radio broadcast," Nash offered, "Maybe someone out there has the solution to this."

Linkara was still waiting on results of the analysis on the pods his spaceship, Comicron-1 was doing.

Marzgurl was examining the notes they all received. "Isn't it odd how we're the only ones who got notes like these?" she pointed out to the rest of the crew.

"What are you getting at?" That Dude in the Suede, an anime reviewer from New Zealand asked.

"That whoever invited us knew this was going to happen," Marzgurl replied, "This whole event was one big trap for us."

"That's awful," Luke Mochrie gasped.

"But I have no idea who would do this, or why," Marzgurl replied, "And what do they think they're going to accomplish by this…"

…..

Rabbit and the others still waited inside the Jade Palace for Shifu to come outside.

"This is not like him," Viper commented, "He usually doesn't sit in meditation like this for that long."

"Ok, I'm getting tired of this," Carmelita growled, pulling out her shock pistol, "I'm busting down the door!"

She shot a shock blast which knocked the door to Shifu's room open. And what they saw horrified everyone who caught a glimpse of it.

There lied the red panda, a sword stabbed through his heart!

"MASTER SHIFU!" Crane, Viper, and Monkey screamed in horror, rushing to their master's side. But it was too late to save him.

As the cops prepared to examine the scene of the crime they saw a cryptic message written in blood on the wall next to the body: "ALL THOSE IN CHINA MUST DIE!"

"This….this monster," Sly gasped, trying not to gag.

…

Somewhere in another world, someone had set up some monitors in several of the other worlds. He was watching everything that had transpired with a front row seat.

"All according to plan," the mystery man laughed to himself, "All according to plan…."


	9. Mayhem is On the Air

**The Toon Files Episode 100: Mayhem is On the Air.**

Double D and Mantis were nearing the Toon Town City Hall.

"Would it be too hard to ask someone if we can borrow their bike?" Mantis asked, annoyed.

"We'd have to find someone who has one," Double D replied, "And look, we're almost there anyways."

"Anyways," Mantis added, "Why did that one person infect our databases to delete our old case files?" the kung fu master scientist continued, "It's not even like those files were connected to cases in progress. What would someone want to hide by doing this?"

"And are these events even connected, that's the significant question for me," Double D added.

….

Back at Shifu's crime scene, the cops searched for clues while the masters grieved.

"How could this have happened?" Crane growled, pounding the ground with his wing.

"Hey," Sly said, looking under Shifu's bed, "What's this?" Feeling around, he pulled out a photograph from under the bed.

"That's a castle," Fox said, "And it doesn't look like anything from this world."

"Wait Fox, we know this place," Rabbit realized.

"Where is it supposed to be?" Carmelita asked, looking at the photo.

"This is the castle of King Caltrin," Rabbit explained, "It was the site of where one of the first major investigations in toon detective history occurred."

"Then we have to get there, as fast as we can," Carmelita said, pulling out her cell. "There is an Interpol station nearby in Toon Town."

"Then let's go," Sly nodded, and the officers and the Wild Things ran off.

Viper made sure that Tigress and Tai Lung's cubs did not find out about their beloved grandfather's death until the time would be considered right.

…

Back at City Hall, the audience members were beginning to panic since none of the pods were opening and releasing the people from the real world.

"Not now, not here," Francis mumbled, "Please everyone, calm down, we're doing everything we can to keep this under control!"

"Is there anything we can do to help?" Mrs. Brisby asked, not knowing about the bombing that had happened in her home world.

"Just keep your cool everyone," Coco said, the bandicoot opening her laptop.

Twilight also informed Jimmy and Francis about the virus that erased the data about old cases back at the TDC.

"Oh great, just great," Jimmy frowned, pulling out some of his gadgets in the heat of the moment, "This is just as bad as knowing that some of the prisoners like Harrison Reiner are still on the loose."

"We got something prepared," Dawn spoke up, "The spirits told me this would be helpful."

"What is it?" Rouge asked.

"An old recorded case that's not where any of the real world people are," Dawn explained, "Show it to the audience to keep them preoccupied while we work on this."

"Got it," Gordon nodded, the cat had also been along for the event.

And thus, the video began playing.

…..

**Muppet TV Studio, Hollywood, California 1997.**

In the 90s, the Muppets new ambitious project was a tv show entitled Muppets Tonight, filmed in a tv studio rather than a theater. And instead of Kermit hosting, it was another muppet named Clifford.

Now this was before the Christmas case that happened in their world 14 years later, so the Electric Mayhem were still together.

"Ok everybody, listen up," Clifford called, "Tonight's special guest is Neve Campbell, don't mess this bad boy up."

"Gotcha boss," nodded Andy and Randy Pig, who were Miss Piggy's nephews. They were hired as doormen, but even then that job often proved to be a little too challenging for the young pigs.

"It's great to be here Clifford," Ms. Campbell smiled.

"It's nice to have you here," Kermit and Clifford nodded. "The green room is just down the hall to your right. There's a tv on so you can now when you're expected on camera."

"Got it," Neve nodded with a smile.

"Nothing can go wrong now," Clifford said, wiping sweat off his brow.

But something would.

…

Later, during the taping, Pepe the prawn and Seymour the elephant were finishing up their act.

"Is moi on next?" Miss Piggy asked hopefully.

"No, Electric Mayhem's up next baby," Clifford replied, earning him a smack from the pig diva.

"We're up!" Dr. Teeth began, the Electric Mayhem beginning to rock out.

And everything was going well until midway through the song when a loud boom was heard.

"What in the world?!" Kermit exclaimed.

"It came from the green room, let's go!" Clifford called. The main muppets rain to the green room, where they found painting splattered all over the walls, and covering Neve as well.

"Was this someone's idea of a joke?" Neve frowned, "Because if it was….heh it wasn't funny."

"Neve, Neve, this wasn't anything we planned," Clifford did his best to assure, "Someone must've made a plan to do this. I promise we'll find out who did it, just don't leave the studio."

"Fine," Neve nodded in reply, "I'll give you an hour to find out who the culprit is."

"This is where we come in," Dr. Bunsen Honeydew, the eccentric inventor spoke up, "Beaker and I have dealt with explosive technology in the past, so we can figure out what kind of explosive this way."

"Mimimimi," Beaker meeped. Bunsen's long-suffering assistant was nervous this would also end in pain for him.

…

"So the green room went boom boom ok?" Pepe asked when Clifford explained what went down a few minutes earlier.

"Yup, that's pretty much it," Clifford nodded.

"At least that isn't messing up our act," Seymour said, pulling out some pixie sticks.

"We're gonna be doing some candy juggling," Pepe explained, ripping one open and eating the contests, "You should really try one, ok? They crackle and burst in your mouth."

"Nah, my agent recommends I stay on my diet," Clifford replied in a tone suggesting he was a little creeped out by what he had seen. "Say, where did you go after your bit was over?"

"We went to the cafeteria," Seymour said, "You get special discounts during show hours, you know."

"Why do you ask?" Pepe questioned.

"No reason," Clifford replied, walking off.

…..

Electric Mayhem had just finished their performance.

"Yo, Gonzo just told us what happened," Floyd said to the host of the show, "That sucks."

"Indeed it does," Clifford nodded, "You guys rocked out, though!"

"Why thanks," Janice smiled appreciatively.

"And poor Neve, getting all messed up like that," Dr. Teeth sighed, "Now I feel bad about worrying about my guitar."

"Why? What happened to your guitar?" Clifford asked, puzzled.

"Well, the one I used on tonight's show isn't the one I usually use," Dr. Teeth explained, "This one sounds different and plays a few different notes."

"Great, now I have two mysteries on my hands," Clifford sighed, "I hate being a host."

"Just, like, trust in yourself dude," Janice encouraged, giving hippie style advice.

"I'll be sure to keep that in mind," Clifford replied, heading off to question who he felt with also potential suspects.

…

Clifford knocked on the door to Miss Piggy's dressing room.

"Is it the paparazzi?" the pig diva said in a sing-song tone.

"No, it's Clifford," the host muppet replied flatly, "Can I talk with you?"

"You don't have to be so rude," Miss Piggy replied, opening the door and setting a remote down. "What do you want to talk about?"

"I was wondering if you had any kind of grudge against Neve," Clifford said.

"What?" Piggy gasped, offended, "You think moi would get her hands dirty by getting someone else dirty?"

"Say," Clifford noticed, "Is that Dr. Teeth's guitar next to your closet there?"

"Ah crud," Miss Piggy said, lowering her head, "Look, moi wanted to expand her talents, so I took it just to get some practice. I was going to give it back, I swear."

"Ok, I believe you," Clifford said, taking the guitar, "Just don't go getting into any more trouble."

"I won't," Miss Piggy promised.

"It's already been 25 minutes," Clifford frowned, looking at his watch, "I have to hurry before Neve decides to leave." The pink muppet raced off.

…..

Clifford decided to question Andy and Randy pig to see if they had seen any suspicious figures enter the TV studio during the day.

"Hey Andy, Randy!" Clifford called.

"Yeah?" the pig siblings replied, not taking their eyes off the Game Boy they were playing.

"Put down that video game," Clifford groaned, "There's something I have to ask you boys."

Andy literally set the Game Boy down on the hat rack in front of him. "What did you want to know boss-man?"

"Did you see any weird or creepy guys come into the studio today?" Clifford asked, hoping they could remember.

"Creepy?" Randy replied, "There was that guy in a ghost mask we saw on TV."

"That was a clip from Neve's movie, Scream," Clifford explained, wondering why he had expected any other kind of answer.

"There was that big bear by the door who kept sitting there," Andy remembered.

"That's Bobo, he's the security guard for the studio," Clifford replied, regretting giving the siblings jobs here.

"Then we got nothing," Andy responded honestly.

It was then that Clifford realized he still was holding Dr. Teeth's guitar, and figured he probably should go return it. "We'll keep in touch," Clifford told the young pigs.

…..

The Electric Mayhem were also in the cafeteria now, chowing down on a special on-sale pizza.

"Wow, Pepe was right about these details," Zoot said, while Animal devoured his plate like an…..animal.

"Yo Dr. Teeth," Clifford called, "I got your guitar back."

"Superb," the leader of the band smiled, showing off his shiny teeth, "Where was it?"

"Miss Piggy of all people had it," Clifford replied, handing the guitar back to the band leader, "Said she wanted to have some lessons with it."

"Well, that's intriguing," Dr. Teeth said, "I'm just glad to have it back, my groove was just not full that last song."

"Give my regards to Neve," Floyd said to the Muppets Tonight host, "We all thought Scream was awesome."

"I will man," Clifford nodded, but he was still getting nervous because he hadn't found any answers to the case yet. He figured to go back to square one.

….

As Clifford walked down the studio's halls, Dr. Honeydew and Beaker called for him.

"Beaker and I were able to find some pieces of the explosive Clifford," the eccentric inventor explained, "And we've found some interesting pieces of information about it."

"Go on, tell me," Clifford encouraged.

"Well, from what we've gathered, this bomb was not on a timer," Bunsen explained, "However it detonated, there must have been some kind of signal that was sent to it, but we don't know through what means it was delivered."

Beaker meeped in agreement.

"So, we know this was no usual bomb," Clifford deduced, "But that still doesn't tell us who the culprit is."

"That seems to be the case, yes," Bunsen nodded, wiping his glasses clean from smears, "Just tell me if we can be of assistance."

"Count on it Bunsen," Clifford nodded, heading back to the green room.

…

Neve had gotten washed up and changed out of the outfit that was covered in paint.

"Did you find anything out Clifford?" she asked, drying out her hair.

"I've gotten some leads," the host of Muppets Tonight replied, "Look, please Neve, none of us here have anything against you, don't leave, we'd really like to have you on the show."

"Why thank you Clifford," Neve smiled in sincerity, "Though I'm really hoping we can figure out who did this, I'd like to get answers."

"Me too," Clifford nodded in agreement.

"The only other thing that happened was that I couldn't adjust the volume to the TV," Neve explained.

"What do you mean?" Clifford asked.

"Well, I wanted to change the channel because there was a program Courtney wanted me to see before I went on, but the remote was missing so I had to watch the show, and that TV was rather loud."

Clifford's eyes suddenly widened. "I've got it," Clifford grinned, "I know who is behind this!"

…

Clifford and Neve went over to Miss Piggy's room again. Clifford knocked on the door.

"Who is it?" Piggy sang, opening the door.

"It's me again," Clifford said, "And this time, I want bigger answers, because I know you're the one who created the paint bomb, Miss Piggy!"

"What? Moi?" Miss Piggy laughed, "Are you being insane, Clifford?"

"No, I'm quite sane," Clifford replied, "And I know how you rigged the paint bomb to blow at just the right moment."

"What makes you think it was me and not anyone else?" Miss Piggy asked.

"Dr. Teeth's guitar," the host explained.

"Ok, I'll admit I took the guitar without asking but how does that connect to the paint bomb?"

"It was the key to your plan," Clifford explained, "Bunsen told me that the bomb was not one linked to a timer, rather, it had some kind of sensor. And when Neve told me that the remote control to the TV in the green room went missing, I figured out what kind of sensor it was…..a noise sensor."

"How did that help her?" Neve asked.

"The sensor was rigged to go off when a certain note was played. That's why you really took the guitar, so Dr. Teeth would have to use his backup, which was the only guitar that played the right note to activate the bomb's sensor."

"That's why she took the remote to the TV," Neve realized, "Because if I changed the channel there was a very good chance the note would never be picked up by the sensor. That's also why the volume was turned up extra loud, it was added insurance."

"But everything you are saying is just a theory," Miss Piggy said as a last defense, "Where is your proof that Moi is behind this crime?"

"Sorry to say that I already caught you with the proof," Clifford replied with a smirk, "That remote I saw you with earlier, that's the remote to the green room TV. And I see it sitting right there."

"Ah crap," Miss Piggy repeated.

Neve understandably began to look a bit upset. "Why did you do this?" she asked the diva Muppet, "You really could have injured me with this stunt!"

"Because you stole my screen time!" Miss Piggy growled, the two women eying each other. It was clear that a battle was about to begin.

"I'll just be on my merry way," Clifford told the two, slowly backing away. The host soon heard the sound of Neve successfully kicking Miss Piggy across the room, "So, you're on in 5 minutes Neve," he quickly added.

….

At the Toon Town City Hall, the video recording of the old case had concluded, and while some of the audience members did focus on it, the majority of them were more focused on the internet critics who were trapped in the pods.

"We really can't just bust it open?" Po asked, the three from the Valley of Peace did not know about their master (or in the feline couple's case, adoptive father's) death, neither did Mantis.

"Is there anything we can do?" Tigress asked the detectives from the TDC.

"Like we said, trying to break the machines open could result in a deletion of their minds," Twilight said, "We can't risk anything like that happening."

"Dang it," Tai Lung frowned, pounding the wall with his furry fist.

It was then at that moment that Double D and Mantis finally made it to the event.

"I am accepting a gym membership," Double D panted, as they ran onto stage.

Frylock, Jimmy, Francis, Rouge, and Abigail updated the two on what was transpiring.

"They've gotten stuck in the old case database?" Double D asked, "Have they made any progress?"

"4 of them have completed cases, but 3 of them have yet to start their turn," Francis explained.

"So somebody was trying to keep us from getting here," Mantis nodded to the human.

"But none of us can figure out a motive," Twilight frowned, "Whoever is behind this, what kind of point are they trying to make? What is this guy after?"

(Thank you to all who've read this for 100 cases, it's really been great working on all of these, and I hope you continue to enjoy them as the series goes on and is nearing its final conclusion. A special shootout to my friend Archangel who's really helped me keep my spirits up over the past year and a half and has inspired me to keep going when I wanted to quit. Thanks again, everyone.)


	10. Secrets in the Depths

**The Toon Files Episode 101: Secrets in the Depths.**

Rabbit, Fox, Sly, Carmelita, KW, and Judith were racing from China to King Caltrin's palace.

"He's seen murder before, he should be more willing to cooperate," Fox said to the others.

"We can only hope, my friend," Carmelita replied to her fellow fox, the two girls (and respectively, the two guys as well) were beginning to have some kind of bonding amongst each other.

"When can I eat?" Judith groaned, her gut rumbling.

"Why did we even let them come along?" Sly asked the others, who were just as puzzled as he was.

As the 6 arrived outside the palace, the guards called to them.

"Halt!" a voice called from above. It was Kyri, a hawk who was one of the survivors from the plane case long ago and had now been working as a guard in the palace for over a decade now along with her friends Mason Parker the human, Sarada Tarris the skunk, Farris Arquette the elephant. "What is your purpose for being here?"

"We need to speak with King Caltrin and Queen Lura," Carmelita explained, "Their lives may be in grave danger."

"Really?" Farris asked surprised, "Wait, I know you two," the pachyderm added about Rabbit and Fox, "We got news here about your cases over the past years. Nice job!"

"Thank you, but we must speak with your leaders now," Fox explained.

"Follow us," Maviy smiled, the girl had been a guard/servant since before that initial investigation long ago.

….

"We have some visitors," Lura informed her husband, having looked out the window.

"Interesting," Caltrin replied, "I'm sure it's nothing grave."

…

In the real world, the remaining crew of TGWTG were beginning to receive some interesting information.

"Well that can't be right," Linkara said, reading off a message that his spaceship had sent him.

"What's wrong?" Todd asked.

"The scanners from Comicron-1 are not able to detect where the source of these letters was," the comic book reviewer explained.

"Then where could there have come from?" Oancitizen asked.

"The scanners seemed to be able to point to this very building, at the least," Linkara explained, "And more specifically, it looks like these messages came from the pods…."

"Then there's something in there?" Todd realized, "How is that possible?"

"Maybe those pods lead to some kind of other side," Nash suggested, "That's what the comment box on RDA is suggesting."

"Let's hope they find a way out of there," Marzgurl said.

…

**Atlantica, 1750.**

Obscurus Lupa's turn was next. Lupa LOVED bad movies. She appreciated every bit of the cheese, from the Evil Dead to Aliens Vs. Avatars. Little Mermaid was one of her favorite movies as a kid, and she was now in a VR recreation of the world shortly after the events of the sequel.

"Oh, awesome," Lupa smiled when she realized where she was. She tended to be more optimistic than some of her colleagues.

It didn't take long for the digital arrow to appear and point out the path. "FOLLOW TO REACH CASE," the computerized voice said.

"I'll be a regular Asylum's Sherlock Holmes," Lupa grinned as she headed towards the palace where the humans resided.

….

"I've never heard of anything like this, Eric," Ariel, daughter of King Triton and a former mermaid said to her husband, the prince of the human kingdom she now lived in.

"I find the claims hard to believe too," Eric nodded, "A shadow mermaid? Even for the magic, there's no way that's real."

"Why don't we go check it out?" Lupa smiled, walking into the palace through the front gates.

"Who are you?" Ariel asked the internet critic.

"My name is Obscurus Lupa, and I'm here to present you some assistance with this mystery," she explained.

"Well, we're always glad to have help," Ariel replied, and explained the situation.

Apparently, at night, people in the kingdom had seen a figure going around in the nearby ocean. Though the humans were used to seeing mermaids by this point, this one was unlike any other. This mermaid was completely blue and black all over, and make some mysterious and downright scary noises.

"We just want to eliminate their fears and prove it's all some kind of hoax," Ariel explained, "Even my daughter Melody believes it's real, and she thinks it's cool."

"We'll come with," two voices called. They belong to Art and Marybeth, two of the servants who worked at the palace, "We're always willing to do research for the kingdom archives."

"And I'm coming along for the ride too," Lupa volunteered.

"I guess it's settled," Eric smiled, "To the docks!"

…..

The boat that Ariel and company were going to take out had a vast mast, and along the front end of the ship was a statue of a mermaid wielding a trident.

"That is kind of tacky," Lupa commented, as they set sail from the docks.

"From the villagers' accounts," Eric said, as the palace servants went below deck, "The shadow mermaid never appears too far from off shore, so we won't have to go out far."

"Plus I have some backup," Ariel smiled, winking to Sebastian the crab and Flounder the fish.

"We're here to happy Ariel," Flounder smiled, hopping up from the water.

"Ok, keep my eye out for the mysterious masked mermaid," Lupa said, giving it a nickname she knew didn't really imply. In truth, like Paw, Lupa was less prone to freaking out at the content she viewed and was a really calm and rational person. She looked at the ship statue's trident pointing port.

And then the shadow mermaid appeared!

"Look up ahead!" Ariel called. Lupa rushed to get a good look at what she was seeing.

A mermaid, like the stories said, covered blue and black leaped out of the water and gave an unearthly screech, then splashed down into the waves below.

"I'll give whoever is doing this points," Lupa said, knowing that because she was in a VR realm and was told in advance that she would be solving a mystery, she never believed even for a split second that the aforementioned shadow mermaid could be for real.

Eric came running out from below deck. "Did I miss it?" the prince asked. Ariel nodded in confirmation, "Darn it, someone blocked off the door, I couldn't get out for a bit."

….

A few more minutes, Art and Marybeth also came up from the lower deck of the ship.

"What took you two that long?" Lupa asked the servants.

"I thought we told you," Art replied, "Marybeth and I wanted to do research, we kept looking down to see if we could a look at the shadow mermaid from the lower levels, but alas."

"And Prince Eric, no disrespect meant," Marybeth continued, "But the ship was really rocking, you might not have noticed it, but I slipped and bumped my head on a wall."

"Ouch," Ariel frowned, "Is it anything serious?"

"No, Art helped apply a bandage," Marybeth explained.

"I also gashed my ankle, but I managed to stop any significant bleeding," Art added, showing the covered wound.

"This trip was a bad idea," Eric sighed.

"No it wasn't," Lupa spoke up, "You wanted to solve a mystery, and I'm here to help make sure it gets solved."

"That's very nice of you Lupa," Ariel nodded, "But I think it is best we head back to the dock."

"Fine," Lupa said, deciding to continue her investigation when they got back.

…..

Eric maneuvered the ship back into the dock. "We don't tell any of the villagers about what we saw," the prince informed the makeshift crew.

"We promise, your highness," Art and Marybeth bowed.

Lupa went over to the humans she had met in this VR realm. "So, when you were below deck, did you guys see each other?"

"What do you mean?" Marybeth asked, pulling out her pen that she preferred to jot down notes.

"Well, I was thinking about the shadow mermaid," Lupa said in a tone of an exaggerated detective from a Sherlock Holmes parody, "And some things just don't seem right. I have to take the skeptical approach here, it is so cool!" she added that last bit in her peppy happy tone.

"Wait, you think that mermaid was fake?" Art asked.

"E-yup," Lupa nodded, "And I think it was someone on the boat pulling a prank on the whole village."

"That's crazy," Sebastian said, walking on shore, "Flounder and I were looking around when Ariel yelled, we didn't see anyone jump off from the side of the boat."

"Say, didn't someone lower the mast just before we saw it?" Ariel realized.

Eric shrugged. "I didn't," the prince said in response, "Someone else must've done so."

"Let's just head back to the palace," Ariel said, "Today has been pretty needlessly frustrating."

As the group made their way back, Lupa stood behind the rest of the group, eying them suspiciously.

"Ariel's alibi is perfect, I was with her at the time," the cheesy b-movie critic told herself, "But those 3 were all below deck and out of sight. Any one of them had the perfect chance to don a disguise."

…..

Melody, Eric and Ariel's daughter was waiting for her parents back at the palace.

"So, what did you see?" she smirked to her folks.

"We didn't see anything, honey," Eric said in a tone that while he managed to keep a straight face, one could tell he was lying.

"Don't try to hide something from me, you know I'll find it," Melody replied.

"All right," Ariel nodded, "We saw what we think is the shadow mermaid," she told her daughter, not wanting to 100 percent flat out say that they saw what everyone claimed to be what was haunting the town.

"So it IS real," Melody chuckled, "Sweet."

"I wouldn't be so sure," Lupa spoke up, "I'm here as a detective and I can promise you, I'll get to the bottom of this mystery."

"Thank you Lupa," Ariel said, "It's nice to have you as a friend."

Lupa did crack a smile at how a character from a movie she liked as a child now considered her a pal. "I won't let you down, your majesty."

"Just don't let the shadow mermaid get you," Art joked, jotting down a few more notes using a feather quill.

"Ha ha, super funny," Lupa laughed sarcastically as she left the palace to go back to the ship.

…..

The internet critic of went back to the kingdom's dock and got aboard the ship.

"Even if some of the evidence managed to wash away in the ocean," Lupa deduced, "There has to be something that was left behind here on the ship." She looked at the statue with the trident facing starboard.

Lupa knew that the natural place to start looking was below deck. She was quick to notice a heavy chest lying beside the door.

"Eric was right about that," she commented, "Maybe the culprit placed this here to create a list of suspects so it wouldn't seem so obvious."

The critic realized a few moments later that she neglected to ask which person was in which room down below, but she figured she could solve that part using detective skills.

Hearing a creaking noise, Lupa saw some boards that had a dent in them.

"This must be the place Marybeth hit her head," she realized, "It does look painful."

It was then that Lupa heard a gust of wind coming from somewhere nearby. "That's odd, this area is supposed to be completely sealed, no leaks."

Walking through a small hall and into another room, Lupa found the hole in the wall. "This is leading into something," she said, feeling the damaged area.

Looking up, she saw that the mini-tunnel created by the hole stopping being surrounded by wood and now by a rock hard substance, like concrete.

A cheeky grin suddenly appeared on Lupa's face. "I just need proof," she told herself. Feeling around she felt something get on her fingers. Pulling her hand out, she saw that it was blood, and it wasn't hers. "Bingo," she chuckled.

…

Lupa ran straight back towards the palace, having solved the mystery.

"You look happy Lupa," Ariel said, "You got some good news?"

"Oh do I ever!" Lupa replied, "I know who the culprit is, the mystery masked mermaid has been unmasked!"

"Interesting choice of words," Eric said, "Who is the culprit?"

Lupa pointed at who she had penned. "It was you….Art!"

"ME?" the servant at the palace gasped, "What makes you think such a silly thing?"

"Because all of the clues point towards you, of course," Lupa replied, "I know how you managed to get into the shadow mermaid disguise. That statue on the front of the ship? It actually has been hollowed out. I discovered this when I went back to the ship."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Art asked.

"You didn't jump from the side of the ship," Lupa revealed, "You jumped out from the very front of the ship. That's also why the mast was lowered, to create another distraction for Ariel and I."

"Interesting," Eric nodded, following Lupa's logic, "That's why the crab and the fish didn't see him either."

"Then how was I able to get onto the ship?" Art asked.

"Through the same way you came in," Lupa explained, "Your costume was a modified wetsuit, and the roar came from you throwing your voice. Then you climbed back into the statue to give yourself an alibi."

"But where's your proof I did any of this?" Art asked, "Because otherwise your stories are pure poppycock."

"There were 2 pieces of proof," Lupa replied with a smirk, "Ones you didn't notice. Firstly, the trident on the state was facing two different directions. It was port at first, but then in changed to starboard. But the smoking gun was the blood I found at the bottom part of the hollowed out area. Blood that matches the wound around your ankle, Art. Now give it up, you've been found."

Art held his head down in shame. "I'm so sorry, your highness," he apologized to the royal couple.

"But why would you do something like this?" Ariel asked, puzzled.

"Because I wanted to put our kingdom on the map," Art explained, "We're actually fairly small in comparison. I thought having a mystical figure like the shadow mermaid would attract more people to visit here."

"You were spooking everyone out," Melody commented.

"We're not upset," Eric replied, "But next time, don't go for the fantasy element here."

"It was great working with you," Lupa smiled to the VR Little Mermaid characters. Lupa began to flicker as she had completed her mystery, and she was about to join the other critics who completed their cases in waiting.

…..

Double D, Mantis and Twilight, all together again, decided to bring up the fear they all had about this incident.

"We think that whoever is behind this," Twilight explained, "Is someone who's been in the TDC already."

"You actually think it could have been one of us?" Francis asked, chuckling at the very idea, "That's just not possible."

"But who else could it have been then?" Double D asked, "During this project, we kept everything under tight wrap until the last few weeks before tonight. It would have taken a lot more time for someone to create a system error of this magnitude."

"But who that had been in the complex would have wanted to do this?" Shizuku asked, the girl the Baron invited wanted to help out in some fashion.

…

Back in Caltrin's realm, the 6 visitors raced into the throne room. Caltrin had gone back to his quarters, while Lura was still on her throne.

"Are you here to see Ageel?" the queen asked, "My son's doing archery in the south wing."

"We need to speak with the king," Sly said quickly and sternly, "His life may be in danger!"

"What?!" Lura gasped, horrified at the news.

"Where is he?" Fox asked with a firm voice.

"In our room in the east tower," Lura said. The 6 guests took off, leaving the queen to be on the throne, somewhat overwhelmed by the circumstances.

And things were only going to go more downhill from here.


	11. Tanuki Terror

**The Toon Files Episode 102: Tanuki Terror.**

It felt like a race against time as Sly and the others made their way through Caltrin's palace.

"Sly, ready your shock pistol too," Carmelita advised her partner/boyfriend.

Sly for the longest time did find it odd to be the one using a shock pistol rather than being targeted by one, but hey, that was one of the perks of faking amnesia and now working for Interpol.

Judith was about to open her mouth, but KY slammed it shut before she could say anything. "You're not getting food here Judith, quit asking," KW growled.

Fox kicked open the door to Caltrin's room to find…..the king brushing his teeth.

"Who goes there?" Caltrin demanded, after rinsing his mouth out.

"Thank goodness," Rabbit sighed, "We thought something bad might have happened to you, your majesty."

"What is this something bad?" Caltrin asked, raising an eyebrow.

"We'll tell you on the way back to the throne," Sly said, "Just stay by us, ok?"

….

Back in the Toon Town City Hall, though things remained in the condition they had started in, the audience members really wanted to get involved.

"Are you getting anything done?" Redd Wolf frowned, pulling out her signature frying pan.

"Please, just keep calm everyone," the Baron requested over a microphone.

It was then that 6 figures came running into the room where everyone was: Crane, Mr. Ages, and Mrs. Brisby's 4 teenage children.

"Crane, what are you doing here?" Tigress asked.

"You three have to come back to China now," Crane panted.

"How come?" Tai Lung asked, seeing the fear in the avian kung fu master's eye.

"It's Shifu," Crane frowned, "He's….." he whispered the rest into his friend's ears.

"WHAT?!" the panda, tigress, and snow leopard trio yelled in horror.

Timothy, Martin, and their sisters explained what happened in Thorn Valley to their mother and Justin.

"How awful," the grown woman mouse gasped.

Inside the pods, only two more of the internet critics had yet to solve their cases.

"Please succeed," Rarity said in a silent whisper towards the pods that connected to the real world, "The 7 of you real people just may save all of us…"

…..

**Tama Hills, Japan, 1994.**

The second to last internet critic to end up in one of the VR worlds was JesuOtaku. JesuOtaku (or JO for short) was 's main anime reviewer. She has reviewed lots of shows and movies from the eastern country.

She was even doing a Studio Ghibli retrospective, which is why she got annoyed when she realized what world she ended up in.

"Pom Poko?" JO frowned, having been turned into a tanuki (a sort of raccoon who were known for having a notable….."pouch") to fit the environment like the Buster was in his case, "Well, at least it's not Tales from Earthsea," she shrugged.

"Oh hi there," Shoukichi, one of the younger tanuki called to JO, "You must be new to Tama Hills. Would you like to join us for our picnic?"

Red text appeared in front of JO that only she could see which read "Yeah, you jerkass eco-terrorists!"

"Thank god red snark titles, you came with me," JesuOtaku sighed, relieved.

"We just have to stop at our temple first," Shoukichi explained, "There's a gift I want to pick up for my wife Kiyo for our anniversary."

"Sure, whatever," JO replied, shrugging.

….

The two tanuki went back towards the temple. JO waited outside while Shoukichi went inside. All of a sudden, breaking the calm silence of the day was a loud yell of terror.

"What happened?" JO asked, she didn't need the digital arrows to be led to the mystery.

"It's Sasuke….he's dead!" Shoukichi exclaimed. A friend of his who wore glasses was lying dead on the temple floor, a knife in his chest.

"Geez that's gory," JO said in a tone that was rather nonchalant. She didn't care much for the movie, you see. A candy she had been chewing accidently fell out of her mouth and landed on the body.

"We have to tell the others," Shoukichi exclaimed, "The humans must have done this!"

"That probably wasn't it," JesuOtaku said to herself, trying to get a good look at the body to begin the investigation. Before long, she began to feel that something seemed off about the victim, but then Shoukichi cut her off.

"Come on!" he insisted, and JO had to comply.

…..

"What's freaking you out?" Gonta, one of the more aggressive tanuki chuckled, as he stood beside his wife Otama came up to them as he saw JO and Shoukichi run up.

"Sasuke's been killed!" Shoukichi yelled in no uncertain terms.

"What?" Oroku, the only female elder of the Tama Hills tanuki gasped.

"Follow us," JO encouraged.

But when the group who went back to the temple, Sasuke's body was no longer there!

"What the?" Shoukichi gasped. "How can this be?"

"Is this some kind of sick joke?" Otama frowned.

Suddenly, Kiyo was heard in the distance screaming. "No!" Shoukichi exclaimed, fearing his mate was in danger. The tanuki took off once again.

….

And this time, they found results. "He….he's dead," Okiyo pointed, Sasuke's body lying in front of her.

Gonta checked his pulse. "He's gone…" he frowned, pounding the ground in anger, "Those blasted humans!"

Elder Oroku carefully pulled the dagger out of the murdered tanuki. "How tragic," she frowned. The other elders were out with some of the younger tanuki who were practicing their transformation powers in the nearby construction areas.

"Who could have done such a thing?" Shoukichi asked.

"I'm telling you, it's those evil humans!" Gonta insisted.

"I wouldn't be so sure," JesuOtaku spoke up.

"Who are you?" Kiyo asked the anime reviewer.

"Call me JO," she replied, "And the point I'm trying to make is this: If it was a human who killed this guy whose name I don't care to remember, wouldn't they have used a gun, not a blade? And on that same note, why would a human take the time to move the body?"

"Move the body?" Kiyo asked, confused.

"We first found Sasuke's body back in the temple," Shoukichi explained to his mate, "But when we went back, somebody moved his body to where you found it."

"But who could have done something like that?" Gonta demanded to know.

"I have a theory," JO spoke up.

…..

"Me?" Otama asked, shocked by the accusation.

"I'm just saying, you're the prime suspect," JO replied, "When Shoukichi and I came running up, you were walking towards the others, too."

"I was just going to get some space to stretch," Gonta's wife replied.

"She can't be the killer," Oroku spoke up.

"How so?" JO replied.

"It takes about 5 minutes to get to this site from the temple if you're going at a fast enough pace," the female elder explained, "According to my examination, the time of death is exactly 30 minutes ago. Though we were all in separate parts of these grounds, no one wandered off for any significant period of time. The only time she wandered off was about 10 minutes ago."

"Who asked you?!" the red snark tittles appeared for just JO, which served as a manifestation of her more angry comments.

"Ok then, I'll need to ask the alibis of everyone who was at this little picnic of yours," JO told the tanuki of Tama Hills.

"Speak to Gonta," Kiyo whispered to JO as she subtly walked past.

….

"Are you completely out of your mind?" Gonta frowned to JO as the temple was now being used as an interrogation room.

"Indeed I am," JO smirked, "From what I know of your so called "personality" you're rather aggressive towards one you deem as weak, and quite insulting too. As far as we know, you could have offed one of your own and made the victim into a martyr for your cause."

"How do you accuse me of murder!" Gonta yelled, standing up, ready to pounce if he got ticked enough, "Yes, I'll gladly kill as many of those accursed humans as I see fit, but I would never murder one of my fellow tanuki just to make a point."

"Take a chill pill," the red snark titles advised Gonta, though he couldn't see them.

"Not now sarcastic side," JO whispered to the subtitles. She knew she had to solve the case if she wanted out of the VR recreation she was trapped in.

"Wait a minute," Gonta realized, "Maybe someone here wanted to frame me," the warrior tanuki figured, "And I'm more than willing to bet that it was that weakling Shoukichi, he's always disagreeing with me. Go talk with him."

"Eh, sure," JO shrugged, knowing from watching Detective Conan that more often than not, the obvious suspect was not the killer.

"I feel something weird dear," Otama said to her husband as he came out of the temple.

"Don't worry about it," Gonta replied in an assuring tone.

…

"Come in you two," JesuOtaku encouraged Kiyo and Shoukichi.

The tanuki couple did so, getting some weird looks from the other raccoons in their lands.

"What did you want to talk about?" Shoukichi asked.

"I just wanted to question you two about some details on the case," JO replied.

"You don't think one of us is the murderer, do you?" Kiyo asked, frowning.

"Well, if would make sense to a certain extent," JO replied, "In both areas, the two of you were the first to find the victim's body. Pretty suspicious if you ask me. And you are married, after all. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to assume that you are working together."

"That's not true," Shoukichi replied, "Ask anybody else, Kiyo and I are harmless."

"And we were both at the picnic grounds at the time of the crime," Kiyo added, "How could either of us have moved Sasuke's body over that distance?"

"You could have used your transformation powers to turn into something that could move him," JO explained.

"But I'm only good with the basics of transforming," Kiyo explained.

"Besides," Shoukichi added, "You were with me once I found the body here in the temple, and you were near me up until the body was finally found near the picnic site. The timeline just doesn't add up."

"Dang it," JO frowned, hoping she would have found the important details. "Did you see anything odd when you found the body Kiyo?" she asked hopefully.

"Well, around Sasuke I remember seeing these tiny stones he made into a makeshift necklace for himself. All the pebbles were lying by his body. I told him before that that thing would break with the slightest force, but he wouldn't listen to me."

"Now we have to go out and hunt for clues," the red snark titles said accompanied by a frown face emoticon.

"Don't give up hope yet," JO whispered to the text. "I'll be back."

….

Walking away from the rest of the tanuki, JO was thinking about how this mystery was going.

"Ok, just think Conan style," the anime critic told herself, "And I should be able to solve this in no time."

JesuOtaku returned to where Kiyo had discovered the body for the 2nd time.

"Why did the killer bother to do such a thing?" she asked herself, "If he or she was trying to hide their crime, they could have picked a better location."

"I don't get it either," Gonta suddenly said, walking by her, "How could none of us have noticed the psycho moving the body? You think that would be the thing everyone would see."

JO froze. Now she realized what seemed weird before! But she had one more thing she needed to check for confirmation.

"Where are you going?" Gonta asked.

"To solve this mystery," JO replied.

Back at the temple, JO looked over at the ground. "Cmon, it has to be here…" she said in silence to herself.

Looking down, the ground of the temple appeared to be clean. No tiny objects or the like lying around it.

"I've got you now," JO chuckled to herself, she also knew what her proof would be, "There is only one truth."

…..

The other tanuki waited for JO to step outside for, as she called it, a big announcement.

"I've determined the identity of the killer," JO revealed to the animal transformation masters.

"You know?" Elder Oroku gasped, "Who was it?"

JO raised her paw. "The murderer is…Otama!" she pointed to Gonta's wife.

"What?!" Otama gasped, "No way!"

"You're insane!" Gonta growled, "We already established how she can't be the killer."

"And I thought the same thing," JO nodded, "Until I realized we had been fooled this whole time. None of us saw the killer move the body because the body was never moved to begin with! Sasuke was actually killed where Kiyo found her body."

"Then who did I find in the temple?" Shoukichi asked.

"Otama was posing as the victim," JesuOtaku explained, "There was something odd I sensed when I saw the body the first time, and a comment from Gonta made me realize it. The "pouch" was missing," JO explained to the tanuki, "And only the boys have pouches. Guess you forgot a detail, Otama."

"How can you be sure?" Gonta asked, defending his wife.

"Because the stone necklace's pieces were only around where Kiyo found the body," JO explained, "If they came off as easily as she claimed, they should be spread at the first place the body was found, but alas…"

"But that's still proof that she is the murderer!" Gonta yelled.

"But there is," JO replied, "When I first saw the body, I dropped my gum on it by mistake. And I recall you saying you had something stuck to you, Otama. Please show us what it is…."

"But…" Gonta tried to argue.

"Gonta….it's ok," Otama sighed, exposing the gum stuck to her fur.

"You're the killer?" Kiyo gasped, shocked, "Why?"

"Because of the things he said to me…" Otama explained, "You see, though I agreed to follow the plan to not have cubs to preserve our food supply until we beat the humans. But when I visited the elders recently, they examined me and informed me that my body wouldn't allow me to have cubs no matter how hard I tried. And when Sasuke heard, he laughed at me…" she growled.

"Otama…." Gonta gasped in a soft tone.

"How dare he insult my dream of having a family with you Gonta…." Otama cried.

"Well, I guess I'm done for now," JO said suddenly.

The computerized voice announced "CASE COMPLETE. DE-DIGITALIZTION COMMENCING."

And in a flash of virtual light, the internet critic had disappeared.

….

"So someone was trying to lure us into a trap," Todd said back in the real world.

"Pretty much it," the Cinema Snob nodded.

"And unless we do something now," Marzgurl continued, "The Critic, the Chick, Lupa, JesuOtaku, Paw, Film Brain, and the Blockbuster Buster are all in grave danger."

"We should ready for battle," Linkara said, the comic book reviewer taking charge of the remainder of the crew.

"Hold on JO…." Nash said to his girlfriend, concerned for her safety.

…

Back in Caltrin's realm, Ageel, now a young man came up to the officers and his father.

"Wasn't expecting to see any police here," Ageel commented, "How are you doing?"

"Not too well," Fox admitted, "I think we may have picked the perfect time to consider retiring…."

"At least we managed to stop a crime from happening…" Sly said, tempting fate.

"And I still haven't gotten a meal…" Judith grumbled.

All of a sudden, the silence of the palace halls was shattered by the sound of Maviy, Sarada, and Mason screaming in terror.

"That came from the throne room!" Carmelita realized, "Let's go!"

When everyone got into the throne room, they gasped in horror at what they saw.

"Lura….." Caltrin said, feeling like he could vomit.

The queen of the realm had been strangled and was now hung from a chandelier in the center of the throne room!

"Dios mio…." Carmelita gasped, as something fell to the floor from the queen's body.

Reluctantly, Rabbit went and picked up the object. To a lack of their surprise, it was another photo.

And once again, the picture was an image of the past. This time around, it was a photo of Jari.


	12. Frozen Sweat

**The Toon Files Episode 103: Frozen Sweat.**

"What?" Rabbit frowned, "Another picture?"

"And what's the connection here?" Fox continued, "First they found a photo of Hartwell back in Holbrook, then Sonic found a photo of Terk back in the station. Why do we keep finding pictures of killers from the past during these cases?"

Maviy and the other servants helped to lower the body while Caltrin and Ageel looked on in horror.

"No…" Ageel gasped, fighting to hold back tears, "How could this happen….?"

"I thought…the nightmare was over," Caltrin cried, holding his head down.

The servants were doing their best to help with the matters, but there was little they could do to aid the dark mood of the scene.

All of a sudden, Carmelita sensed a shadow go over her face.

"What the…?" the fox inspector said, looking up to see a figure in black running over the rooftop of the palace. The other officers quickly caught a glimpse of the mystery man as well.

"That's him!" Sly pointed, "Let's go!"

Rabbit kept an eye on the man who was running while the group made it outside of Caltrin's palace.

"The hell is going on?" Kyri asked her friends/fellow servants.

"We may just have an idea…." Mason replied, noticing some traces of weird marks on the body of Lura.

"We might have DNA?" Maviy asked.

"We just might," Sarada nodded.

…..

Back at the Toon Town City Hall, the commotion was beginning to rise to uncontrollable levels.

Mantis knew something had to be wrong because of what Crane had just said to his trio of friends who had been attending the portal unveiling.

"Do you want to head back to China?" Double D asked his insect friend, knowing that something very bad probably happened, and he figured Mantis should be there to help his comrades.

"Ok," Mantis nodded, jumping off the stage. "I'm counting on you two!" he called to Twilight Sparkle and Double D.

"There was a bombing?!" Justin growled, the rat of NIMH was very ticked when he learned what happened back in his world.

"What?!" Seiji and Shizuku exclaimed in shock, they already knew what was going on with the people from the real world, but to know there was more madness going on in the multiverse they learned they shared…..

"And none of you detectives did anything to help!" Princess Peach exclaimed angrily.

The reaction caused pretty much all of the guests except for Shizuku and Seiji left in anger.

"Great, just great," Jimmy frowned, hand over his face.

"There's only one real person still needing to solve a case," Francis reported.

…..

**Frozen Lands, 1,000,000 BC.**

Film Brain was the last of the TGWTG critics to end up in a VR case recreation. The British film critic covered movies of both recent and past decades, and had his own tastes and interests.

To fit into the world of the Ice Age movies, Film Brain had been changed into a sloth.

"Oh, you have to be kidding me," the internet critic said, slapping his paw to his face, "I mean, the first movie was ok, but the sequels continually got worse."

The digital arrow appeared over Film Brain's head. "FOLLOW ARROW TO REACH MYSTERY," the computerized voice.

"Fine," Film Brain nodded, heading off in the predetermined direction.

…..

At the end of the arrows was a group known as "The Herd" which consisted of Manny the mammoth, his wife Ellie, their teen daughter Peaches, Sid the sloth, Diego the saber tooth, and Shira, another saber-toothed feline.

"Who are you?" Diego asked Film Brain, "You're not Sid. That's automatically a plus," he snarked.

"Call me….Brain," Film Brain replied, knowing the concept of the internet would allude these characters, to say the least.

It was then that two friends of Peaches's, Louis and Ethan showed up.

"What's with the party?" Ethan asked sarcastically.

"As much as it surprises me, we can't find Sid," Manny said.

"That's odd" Louis said.

As everyone was looking around, something caught Ethan's eye.

"Look up there!" the mammoth pointed with his trunk.

Looking up, Film Brain and the herd members saw Sid atop a massive snow hill.

"AGGHHH!" the sloth cried as a mysterious figure pulled him down into the snow.

"SID!" Manny and Diego called, and they raced to reach him.

"I guess this is the mystery," Film Brain said to himself, and he followed after the anachronistic animals.

…

The herd made it up to the top of the snow mound.

"Where'd he go?" Peaches asked.

"Down into the snow," Diego said, "Let's go get him."

Ethan and Diego dug into the snow, with the mammoths helping to scoop up piles of the frozen rain. Film Brain even lent a paw here.

"What the?" Diego noticed as they got into the cavern below the snow, "He's not here!"

Ethan and Manny jumped down into the cavern. "That's impossible," Manny commented, "Even for someone like Sid, he can't just vanish like that."

"You don't think," Ellie began to realize, "That he's been kidnapped, do you?"

"That would be bad news," Diego laughed, "For whoever kidnapped him. The poor sap's probably regretting it at this very second."

"I'm here to offer my assistance," Film Brain suddenly spoke up, "And I'll track down Sid."

"That's sure nice of you stranger," Peaches commented, "But don't think we don't appreciate it."

"Don't worry about it," Film Brain replied, "Solving this mystery will be very important for me," the internet critic said, being honest in a technical sense about how he was trapped in this VR realm until the case was solved.

"But where should we start looking?" Manny asked.

"He vanished less than 2 minutes ago," Film Brain pointed out, "We have to look in the immediate area to begin with."

"Good thinking," Diego nodded, "Shira and I can try to sniff him out."

"Hunting is my specialty," Shira chuckled in a somewhat wicked tone. She had a little too much fun with this type of thing.

"I see," Film Brain nodded, a bit concerned.

…..

Back in the other worlds, Sly, Carmelita, Judith, KW, Rabbit, and Fox were chasing after the figure that had killed Queen Lura. The mysterious killer still had a lead on them.

"We're going to have to try to surround him!" Carmelita instructed her allies, pulling out her shock pistol.

"_Seriously Bentley, what's taking your sweet time?"_ Sly thought to himself as he accelerated his motorcycle.

"I think I'll be able to eat this guy," Judith grinned with a tone of crazed hunger.

"You are hopeless, you know that Judith?" KW told her fellow Wild Thing, shaking her head.

Rabbit and Fox zoomed down side streets to help aid in Inspector Fox's surround the killer plan.

"We've got him," Fox smirked as she and Rabbit managed to get in front of the killer's vehicle.

"Not yet, you haven't," the group heard the killer laugh in a distorted voice.

"What?" Carmelita asked, confused, as she was soon given her answer.

The various motorcycles were driving near some angled surfaces.

"I'll get him!" Sly exclaimed, going in for a knockout, he was skilled on his feet and would be able to safely jump out of a crash like this.

"You keep telling yourself that," the killer chuckled in the distorted voice, as he suddenly drove up a rock that more or less served as a ramp for him, and flew several feet into the air.

"You've got to be kidding me," KW gasped as the killer's bike landed on a plateau far above and out of reach of the officer's paths.

"Sorry to leave so suddenly, but I have an event to attend to," the killer taunted the officers.

"Damn it!" Carmelita yelled angrily, hitting the breaks on her motorcycle.

"What can we do now?" Fox asked.

"We're back to square one," Rabbit sighed.

….

Back in the Ice Age VR world, Film Brain was leading the search for Sid.

"This mystery is surprisingly not given away in the first five minutes," the critic said to himself, "No dead giveaways given away in the immediate scene of the crime."

"What are you talking about?" Manny asked, of course not familiar with the concept of technology.

"Oh, never mind that comment," Film Brain replied, "Did you two find anyone suspicious in the area?" he asked Diego and Shira.

"No, we didn't," Shira replied.

"And that's something that's bothered me," Diego explained to the other herd members, "We haven't even found any set of tracks whatsoever."

"That is a good point," Film Brain nodded, "Unless the culprit is some kind of bird, there should have been some trace of where they took Sid."

"Maybe the perp managed to cover his tracks somehow," Ethan suggested to the sloth who was really a human being internet critic.

"But we were on the scene almost immediately," Film Brain pointed out, "One of us would have seen him or her trying to get away, the mound we were on was surrounded by a mostly open landscape."

"Maybe we should split up for the search," Ellie suggested.

"Good idea," Manny nodded, "Peaches, you come with your mother and me."

"Sure father," Peaches nodded.

"Diego and I will be a group," Shira smiled seductively.

"Of course lover boy," Manny teased under his breath.

"Shall we work together Ethan?" Louis asked the mammoth who used to be a bully but came to change his ways over time.

"Sure man," Ethan nodded, the younger mammoths had teamed up. Ethan offered "I can grab some vines if we find him."

"I'll go on my own," Film Brain assured the locals of this world.

"Whatever works for you," Diego said to him.

The detective critic knew by working by himself he'd have an easier time monitoring any suspicious behavior.

"Let's just get this over with," Film Brain said to himself.

…

The human-turned-sloth made his way across the snowy world.

"Man, this series consistently gets more and more inaccurate," he commented about the world around him.

It didn't take too long for him to discover where Shira and Diego were searching.

"You never cease to amaze me," Shira commented to her now boyfriend.

"About what?" Diego asked.

"That despite everything you've gone through, you're still close pals with Sid. You always like to tease him."

"I've changed over time," Diego smiled, "And for the better, if I do say so myself."

Film Brain was hiding behind some rocks on a plateau above them. "So, I think I can still consider the possibility of one of them being the culprit by themselves. I doubt this was an action they did together."

"You smell something?" Diego asked Shira, being a carnivore, he had a heightened sense of smell. Being a creature of prey in this world, Film Brain would have to hide further away.

He left to go investigate the scene before they noticed he was nearby.

…

As the herd members and their family and friends continued the search for Sid, Film Brain returned to the initial scene where the saw Sid before he vanished from their sights.

"For a world where there are no machines or modern tech," he said to himself, "This is pretty much a locked room mystery."

The internet critic looked over the facts: Everyone saw Sid calling for help as he was pulled down into the cavern. Once he was in the cavern, the culprit managed to make him vanish and take him to a place that neither he nor the heard members could possibly locate. And all of this managed to happen in only a matter of seconds. How was any of this possible?

However, Film Brain was about to get the breakthrough he was looking for.

Crash and Eddie, two brother possums appeared from under the snow.

"Have you seen Sid?" they asked Film Brain.

"No," the British internet critic replied.

"Well, he probably can't be underground then," Crash said "The ground all around here is rock-solid."

Film Brain's eyes widened. "That's it!" he exclaimed suddenly.

"What's it?" the possum brothers asked, confused.

"I know who took Sid and where he is," Film Brain explained, "Gather everyone back here."

….

Manny, Ellie, Peaches, Diego, Shira, Ethan, and Louis were called back to the scene where the whole mess began.

"What's this I hear about you knowing what happened?" Diego asked Film Brain.

"That's exactly it," Film Brain nodded, "I know where Sid is, and who is responsible for his disappearance."

"Then where is he?" Manny asked.

"He's still where we started," Film Brain revealed with a smirk, climbing up into the snow mound and dropping down into the cavern. Digging deeper, he revealed Sid, who had been covered in a massive pile of snow.

"Oh thank goodness!" the sloth gasped, getting up, albeit his joints had frozen a bit for being caught under all that white.

"How did you know he was there, Brain?" Shira asked.

"Once Crash and Eddie told me the ground was solid," Film Brain explained, "It was then I realized that it wasn't someone pulling Sid down into the cavern, it was something. And that thing was a vine wrapped around his waistline."

"I was knocked out by someone," Sid nodded in realization.

"But who caused this?" Peaches asked.

"Oh, that's simple," Film Brain replied, "The culprit was Ethan."

"What? Are you kidding me?" Ethan chuckled nervously.

"No, I can't say I am," Film Brain replied slyly, "You were the one who noticed Sid on top of the snow mound. You probably tied a rock and pushed it into the cavern, and you kept an eye on him to see when he would be pulled down. And once we all rushed up there, you helped push down the snow to keep him covered."

"Wow, jerk," Sid said.

"But why would you do something like this?" Peaches asked Ethan.

"Because I wanted to be the one who found him," Ethan admitted to the herd, "I wanted to do something to make me look like a hero, so that….I could impress you, Peaches."

"You know I'm already with Louis," Peaches replied, "Look, you don't have to do something big for me to think you're a tough guy."

"I see," Ethan nodded, rubbing his trunk on his face in embarrassment.

"Well, that's that," Film Brain said, completing his VR world case, "Now get me out of here."

And, as if on cue, Film Brain was digitally taken out of the world.

…

After several hours, the Nostalgia Critic, Paw, Nostalgia Chick, Blockbuster Buster, Obscurus Lupa, JesuOtaku, and Film Brain were reunited in the black void that were in before all of the cases had started.

"Well that was awkward," Lupa commented.

"And what was the point of all of this?" Paw asked his fellow critics, "Why did someone want us to solve mysteries that technically weren't real?"

"It had to be a trap," JesuOtaku figured, "Someone wanted us here. I doubt this was just a simple test of deductive reasoning we were brought here for."

"But still, what the hell is going on?!" the Critic exclaimed.

All of a sudden, the computerized voice returned. "COMPLETING UPLOAD TO OTHER WORLD" the voice announced.

…..

"Thank goodness," Twilight said, looking at the readings on the computer screen.

"They have completed all of the cases?" Shizuku asked hopefully, looking at all the empty seats in the Toon Town City Hall.

"That is indeed the case," Double D nodded, wiping sweat off his brow, relieved.

"That's comforting," Francis replied honestly, "At least we know nothing can get worse now…."

The feline would soon come to regret that remark.

As the pods completed their upload/transferring of the people from the real world, the roof of the city hall suddenly burst open!

"What the hell?!" Knuckles gasped. A helicopter was positioned over the hole, and suddenly, several metal chains with hooks lowered.

"Keep the pods safe!" Jimmy instructed.

The various detectives from the TDC sprang into action to allow the internet critics to make the transfer safely.

Some proofed successful, but the attack caught them completely off guard, that two of the chains were able to grab two of the pods before they fought it off.

"No!" Francis frowned as the pods were lifted into the air, taking two of the critics away.

Twilight tried to use her magic to stop the helicopter, but it had managed to fly away with its capture.

"This hasn't been a good day," Abigail said in a grim understatement.


	13. The Thirteenth Hour

**The Toon Files Episode 104: The Thirteenth Hour.**

As the helicopter was flying away from city hall, the remaining Toon Detective Complex members saw the uploading of the people from the real world complete.

Rouge had flown out through the hole in the ceiling to chase after the stolen pods.

Five of the internet critics stepped outside of the pods. They were the Nostalgia Critic, Obscurus Lupa, the Blockbuster Buster, Paw, and the Nostalgia Chick.

"What the hell was all this?" the Nostalgia Critic exclaimed as he and his fellow critics climbed out of the pods.

"Um….I don't think this game is over yet guys," Lupa told the others, seeing characters from various pieces of media standing across from them.

"Please, listen," Jimmy spoke to the people from the real world, "What has just transpired has been a massive amount of confusion."

"We know you must be extremely confused by what has happened," Dawn said, her powers unable to work on sensing real people's feelings.

"Ok, I've given up trying to measure the freakiness level of this whole day," the Buster sighed.

"Let me explain on our behalf," Francis spoke up, "The 5 of you are from the real world, which none of us here are from. We were working on a project that would bridge the gap between our realms."

"I see," the Chick nodded, "This seems like a really bad crossover fanfic."

"We'll explain everything to you back at the Complex," the Baron explained to the internet critics, "Time is off the essence."

…

In the skies above Toon Town, JesuOtaku and Film Brain awoke in their pods.

"What the?!" Film Brain exclaimed as he swayed from side to side.

"I have no idea!" JesuOtaku called as she tried to avoid falling out.

"We're gonna die!" the red snark titles exclaimed.

Rouge was flying behind the pods, trying not to lose sight of the helicopter.

"Hang on!" the girl bat detective/spy called as she zoomed towards the pods.

However, the pilot of the helicopter was prepared for Rouge. The mysterious figure pulled out a gun and fired shots at her.

"Whoa!" Rouge gasped, just barely managing to dodge a few shots, "You're not going to make this easy, are you?"

"Someone help us!" the anime reviewer and British movie review called as Rouge tried to help them out of the pods.

The helicopter was armed with several other weapons, so Rouge knew a mid-air rescue would prove to be impossible, so she decided to just follow them for now and later report where they were to the other detectives.

…

Meanwhile, with Sly and the others, they felt they were out of ideas.

"Damn it, just…just damn it," Carmelita growled, firing her shock pistol randomly out of anger, while Rabbit, Fox, KW, and Judith dodged some of the shots.

Judith had finally learned to stop commenting on her hunger.

"Is there anything me and KW can do to help?" the Wild Thing asked the Interpol inspector.

"I really wish there was," Carmelita sighed, "But I don't think there's anything any of us can do now."

"I wouldn't say that quite yes dear," Sly smirked.

"What do you mean?" Fox asked the raccoon constable.

"The killer may have managed to get away," Sly replied, "But I managed to put a tracker on his motorcycle when I got close to him earlier."

"Sly! You're a genius!" Carmelita complimented, running up and hugging him. Even though the two had gotten closer over the past year, it still wasn't common to be embraced by Carmelita from Sly's perspective.

Sly then pulled radar out of his pocket.

"Can that help us even if he's in a different world?" KW asked the cops.

"Yes, as long as he's not too many worlds away," Sly explained to the others.

"Then let's hurry!" Rabbit called, "We need to end this madness once and for all!"

…

Mantis followed Po, Tigress, Crane, and Tai Lung back to China. The villagers of the Valley of Peace hadn't been informed of Shifu's murder.

Mr. Ping, Po's adoptive father and owner of a local noodle shop saw Mantis running by with a concerned look on his face.

"So you were told of the magistrate's murder as well?" the goose asked.

"Magistrate's murder?" the insect scientist/detective replied, confused.

"We just got a message from the Miaos' world," Mr. Ping explained, "Someone murdered their owners. Dongwa, his siblings and family are fine, but what happened to the humans….it isn't pretty. And the killer vowed to kill every leader in China, too."

"Geez…." Mantis gasped, thinking of learning about Shifu's murder was bad enough.

"At least something like that will never happen here," Mr. Ping chuckled, not realizing how wrong that claim was.

But by the time he said that, Mantis was racing up the stairs to the Jade Palace.

….

"What's yeh-yeh Shifu?" Tigress and Tai Lung's two cubs, a tiger boy and snow leopardess asked innocently.

The feline couple didn't know how to reply. Their cubs were too innocent to be exposed to this kind of horror. They knew the time wasn't quite right.

"He's….somewhere else, kids," Tai Lung replied doing his best to hold in tears because of his adoptive father just being murdered.

Tigress was in another room, pounding the wall so angrily one could assume she was about to completely bring down the building.

"How did this happen?!" she roared like a feral animal.

"Tigress….there's nothing we could have done," Crane explained regretfully, "There were even some cops and Interpol officers here, and they said their names were Rabbit and Fox."

"I remember them," Tigress replied, she, Po, and Tai Lung were involved in the case back in Holbrook's junkyard prison long ago, where Rabbit and Fox along with their friend skunk were among the many toons trapped down there, "It is a weird coincidence they managed to show up right after you found the body…."

"Actually they showed up before the death," Crane explained.

"Why?" Tigress and Po asked, confused.

"This probably sounds hard to believe," Viper said, slithering into the room, "But they came here because they actually thought Shifu was the culprit in another case."

"What?!" Po gasped, "Master Shifu would never hurt someone for no reason! Why would they think something like that?"

"They said they found some evidence pointing to him in a world featuring a place called Thorn Valley," Viper explained.

…..

Mrs. Brisby and Justin followed the 4 teenage mice back to their home world.

"This is awful…" Justin gasped in horror seeing all the destroyed homes and dead mice.

"How could this happen to us?" Mrs. Brisby asked, embracing her family now more than ever, and Timothy didn't react with embarrassment this time.

"I don't know what happened mom," Martin replied, "But we can't just sit here and not do anything about this…"

"What exactly did you have in mind, Martin?" Cynthia asked her brother.

"War," Martin replied in dark flatness, "This isn't a one of a kind type of crime," he said, "These bombings are just going to continue, and you all know it. We need to find out who did this and make them suffer."

"Isn't that a little irrational?" Mrs. Brisby asked her son, concerned.

"And what about all of our friends who got killed?!" Martin growled, "They didn't deserve their fates!"

"I have to side with Martin," Teresa said, the girl standing beside her sibling.

"Justin, you gather the surviving warriors," Martin instructed his stepfather, "Timothy and I will go look into leads on which world is responsible for this."

"Yes, Martin…" Justin nodded, knowing that while they could help the others who survived recover from the loss of their homes and family and friends, an offense needed to be established as well.

Despite being small, these rodents were tough when the going got that way.

….

The limos quickly took the detectives of the TDC and the internet critics back to the Toon Detective Complex.

"This is the worst day of my life," Double D frowned, his machine, while technically a success, had led to so much chaos.

"Isn't this excessive for what is essentially a glorified police station?" Paw asked the toons.

"We need to concentrate on saving JO and Film Brain," Lupa reminded the others.

"But how exactly do we do that?" the Nostalgia Chick asked with a frown. She was upset at Lupa for being the target of Todd's affections, even if she never felt anything in return.

"We do it like we've done it before," Rarity replied, "We find out where they are, and we go and kick butt with weapons specially designed by yours truly."

"First my missing devices, then that blasted computer virus, now this…" Double D groaned, smacking his head against the desk in his lab.

"What's going on with your other inventions?" Coco asked Double D.

"Some of them have gone missing," the detective from the cul-de-sac explained, "Like my DNA scanner/copier."

"That sucks," the bandicoot girl nodded, "But we have to focus on fixing the bigger things now."

"Hey, we're willing to help you guys," the Critic told the toon detectives.

"For real?" Francis asked hopefully.

"Sure," Paw nodded in response, "JO and Film Brain are our fellow critics. We can't let them suffer like this, it would be wrong."

"But that still brings up the fact we have no idea where they are," the Buster pointed out.

The Baron led Seiji and Shizuku back to the portal to their world.

"I'm sorry our first meeting had to get so messed up," the cat figurine brought to life apologized.

"Don't feel bad," Shizuku replied, "For the most part, this was a neat day, even if everything went kinda wrong."

"Be sure to invite us again," Seiji encouraged as he and Shizuku hopped into their portal to their world.

"Got it," the Baron nodded, returning to his fellow detectives.

…..

In the real world, Linkara and Marzgurl were getting their fellow critics ready for the potential battle ahead.

"Pollo is putting the finishing touches on our battle armor," Linkara explained, "And some of us will need to stay behind to monitor us as we head into the pods."

"I'll stay here," Nash volunteered, "With Radio Dead Air I can send any updates to you guys quickly."

Linkara, Marzgurl, SadPanda, and Angry Joe would be heading into the pods while the Cinema Snob, Todd in the Shadows, Nash, and Luke stayed in the convention hall.

"I'm just saying, we may need reinforcements," Marzgurl informed her allies, "If worse comes to worse, we may need to call in the government over this."

"Just bring Lupa back," Todd replied, the music critic was feeling desperate.

"We don't what lies inside these things," Linkara said, taking charge like Kirk or Picard would, "But we know we will have to face it head on. We just need another 90 minutes for all the tech to be ready."

The critics didn't know that they were playing right into a mastermind's hand.

…..

Rouge had followed the helicopter through another world portal.

"I'm not letting you get away!" she called, trying to throw some dummy ring bombs to disable the vehicle.

"Get us out of here!" Film Brain called to Rouge, still unable to get the lock on the pod open, though in the place they were at, it was probably best not to try.

The helicopter made a turn east and flew towards a big mansion.

"This you destination eh?" Rouge figured as she saw the copter begin to descend, dodging more fire from the mystery pilot.

"Why yes it is, Rouge," the pilot called back in his mysterious voice, "But before we split up there's something I want you to keep."

"Huh?" Rouge asked confused as suddenly, a small object flew right towards her, hitting her on the face. It caught her off-guard, and she had to take a moment to catch her vision. But by that point, the helicopter holding the two pods had flown down into the open roof, which closed shortly thereafter.

"This place….I know I've seen it somewhere before," the bat realized, when she looked at the object that had been tossed at her.

"A photo?" she said, confused.

….

Sly, Carmelita, Rabbit, Fox, KW, and Judith kept up to where the signal to Sly's tracker had led them.

"Ugh, a sewer pipe," Rabbit frowned, covering his nose.

"Look, don't complain," Sly replied, "I've done some work in these before."

"Really?" Carmelita asked confused, "On what assignments?"

"Some…in Paris," Sly quickly recovered, needing to keep up the image that he had forgotten his past.

"Where do you think this leads?" KW asked the officers.

"It looks like there is something up, some big buildings," Fox replied, "But I can't get a good look from this angle."

Carmelita pulled out her shock pistol, "I'll lead," she said confidently, "I can't wait to give that blasted evil criminal 19 shocks with this, I'm going to make sure he's hauled off to jail for life!"

"And that's what I love about you," Sly smiled to his girlfriend. At the same time, he was making a call on his cell phone to someone and whispering to the person.

"So get to these coordinates Bentley," the raccoon whispered.

"We'll be there, Sly," the turtle replied on the other end of the line.

The 6 continued on into the sewers.

…..

After being taken down to some lower levels, the world transferring pods containing Film Brain and JesuOtaku were finally set down.

"Ok, this is just getting annoying," the anime reviewer commented.

Suddenly, the kidnapper stepped on top of the pods holding a power tool in his hands.

"What are you going to do with that?" Film Brain asked.

"This," the person replied, turning on the power drill and beginning to drill tiny holes in the top of the pods.

"What's this all about?" the red snark titles demanded to know.

"Well, this is all part of my plan," the kidnapper replied, able to see the text. "In one hour, both of you will die."

"What's so specific about one hour?" JO asked.

"Because based on the size of this room plus the height of these pods, that will be enough time for the water I'm about to start pouring into rise up high enough and flood this room, drowning you both."

"What?!" the critics gasped in shock, "Somebody get us out!"

The kidnapper walked off, chortling to himself.

…..

Back in the Toon Detective Complex, Jimmy got a call from Rouge.

"I know where the other two are," Rouge said, "You have to take the portal east of the Wildcat Café."

"The portal to the east?" Francis realized, "That was the world that had that place….Starlight Manor, am I correct?" 10 years ago, when Francis, Jimmy, and Twilight were in a detective tournament at the Toon Town Grand Hotel, the so-called "prize" was a chance to solve a murder from the past that had occurred at that building. However, the whole contest was a trap by the host, who was the real murderer from that case.

"Yes….in fact that mansion is where they were taken!" Rouge revealed to the other detectives.

"I have no idea what they're referring to," the Critic commented, the multiverse contained a lot of stories the others hadn't informed the real people on.

"Funny you should mention that," Rouge replied to Francis, "Because the kidnapper tossed something at me. When I got a look, I saw it was a picture of Vivian!"

Vivian was a fox who was the one who offed the staff of the aforementioned tournament as revenge for the Starlight Manor incident which led to her best friend committing suicide because of a false accusation.

"But it can't be her," Jimmy said, "She's been locked up, safe and sound."

"Can one of you inform us on what's going on?" Paw asked.

"You all better just prep for battle," Twilight said.

"We got a mansion to get to, folks," Jimmy told everyone.

"All right," Lupa smirked, "I'm gonna get to kick ass Cynthia Rothrock style!"

"I think I'm going to like working with you," Abigail smiled to the B-movie fan.

With Rarity supplying some battle armor, the detectives and the critics set off.

…

In 15 minutes, they managed to make it to Starlight Manor, which had not been owned for several years.

"Everyone keep on guard," Dawn advised, "I'm sensing danger ahead."

"I'll go with the 5 of you," Frylock told the internet critics, "We need to find your friends fast."

The various detectives split up.

"Oh look," Abigail smiled sarcastically, "Someone painted arrows for us to go towards."

"Well, we don't know what this place is filled with," Francis replied, "We can't split up further. We might as well follow an established path.

"Aye," Gordon nodded.

The internet critics and Frylock were headed to the lower levels of the mansion.

"I think I hear something," the Nostalgia Chick said suddenly.

"Where's it coming from?" Frylock asked, concerned.

"That way," the usually passive aggressive reviewer pointed.

With the other detectives, they eventually reached a big open room with a very hi-tech TV monitor installed.

"Something tells me this is important, but I may be wrong," Jimmy said sarcastically.

"What should we do?" Double D questioned.

….

Meanwhile, the Wild Things and the cops and Interpol officers had managed to find their way out of the sewers and into the corridors of a dark building.

"Now we're just getting lost," Judith said.

"Are you getting scared?" KW smirked, thinking the girl who liked to make herself look big and tough was now showing a more vulnerable side.

"No, not at all," Judith replied in a quick and defensive tone.

"Stay sharp everyone," Rabbit advised, "We're coming up to a doorway."

"We don't know who or what is waiting on the other side," Carmelita replied, "So Sly and I will take the lead."

"Are you ready?" Sly asked his girlfriend.

Carmelita grinned widely, pulling out her signature shock pistol and even twirling it a bit. "As ready as I'll ever be."

"Then let's do this!" Fox cheered, raising her paw.

Carmelita and Sly kicked the door open….

….

"The hell are you all doing here?" Knuckles exclaimed, seeing Sly and the others suddenly come into the same room they were in.

"We could ask the same of you," Rabbit replied, recognizing the various TDC members.

"What is going on?" Carmelita asked.

Francis, Jimmy, Twilight, Double D, Abigail, the Baron, Haku, and Rarity all explained what was going on, about Double D's invention, and how the real world people got lured inside.

"So what's the connection?" Sly asked, "There's no chance it was just a coincidence that all of us ended up here."

"Precisely constable," a deep voice chuckled. The group turned to see that the big monitor was on, and the TDC members recognized who was on screen.

"Harrison Reiner!" Double D, Francis, Gordon, and Bartok gasped.

Harrison was one of the most notorious prisoners who was ever held at the cells in the TDC, but during Tyrus and his cult's assault on the complex, they destroyed the jail and some prisoners managed to escape, Harrison among them.

"So you're the one behind all these murders!" Carmelita pointed.

"Yes and no," Harrison replied slyly, "My newest protégé is the one who handled all the dirty deeds, I just provided the motivation. Don't you want to know about all those pictures?"

"The criminals from the past?" Fox replied, confused, "What are you saying?"

"They're all thanks to me," Harrison chuckled, "I know that with just the slightest push, anyone can fall into darkness. I was the one who got Jari's mother hooked on drugs, I'm the one who gave Hartwell the bad therapy, that was more or less the same case with Axel's brother. Convincing Terk to become a fame whore was easy, you know about Nazz, with Vivian I supplied the investigator with the false lead pointing towards her friend, and before all of them was Tyrus. I paid off the group who massacred his town to leave him alive…" Harrison was smiling at what was to him, warm and fuzzy memories.

"You mean…." Francis said, beginning to shake.

"You," Abigail finished, "All this horribleness is because of you!"

"Guilty as charged," Harrison replied, "But the fun's just beginning."

"You intend to kill us?" Jimmy scowled.

Harrison laughed again. "Kill you?" he said offended, "God, no. I want you to be alive and well. If you were dead, you wouldn't be able to see the show I have planned."

"What show?" Haku asked angrily.

…..

In the lower room, the water had nearly flooded all the way into the pods.

"HELP!" JO and her red snark titles cried again.

The Nostalgia Critic and the others busted into the room.

"Hang on!" Lupa called, swimming over to the pods.

However, the critics and Frylock weren't alone in the room.

"Oh no you don't!" Harrison's protégé called, jumping towards them armed with a machete.

"Heads up," Frylock advised, the sentient fast food, shooting fireballs out of his eyes at the killer.

However, the extra weight added because of the water made it very hard to get the pods open.

"Help me!" Blockbuster Buster called, he and the Chick trying to get Film Brain's pod open while the Critic, Lupa, and Paw handled JesuOtaku's.

"Keep going," JO encouraged, but then they had to dodge a slice from the killer's weapon.

"This is hopeless," the Chick frowned, but she would soon be proven wrong.

All of a sudden, one of the walls was burst open by fireworks.

"The water is draining," the Panda King said over his binocucom.

"Thank goodness we saw these people in danger doing reconnaissance of this place," Bentley said to Penelope.

"You said it," the RC expert mouse who had been bust out of prison earlier nodded.

Murray and Dimitri jumped into the room.

"The Murray" will crush your soul!" Murray grinned to the killer.

"I'll just be leaving now," Harrison's protégé said, turning and running.

"Yeah, you better run before we off you, home slice," Dimitri warned.

The other TGWTG critics were now finally able to free JO and Film Brain.

…..

"I see even you weren't told of the extent of the actions I planned," Harrison told the Interpol officers. "You think the murder of Shifu and the bombing of Thorn Valley were the only things I caused this time?"

"Wait….you were the one who stole me DNA scanner, weren't you?" Double D realized.

"Precisely," Harrison confirmed, "I wanted to play a game, so I had my protégé lead you on a trail from the residents of Thorn Valley all the way to Lura."

"Queen Lura's dead?" Mokey and Boober gasped.

"And there's been far more attacks than you have been informed of," Harrison revealed, "Several of which were labeled terrorist attacks. Enough for a good number of the worlds…..to call for war."

"WAR?!" the many detectives exclaimed.

"Why blow everything up when you can watch everyone else tear each other apart?" Harrison smiled.

"Then…the reason our database was infected with that virus," Twilight realized, "Was so you could cover your tracks."

"Correct again, I won't deny your deductive skills," Harrison nodded, "When I discovered the plans of this portal to the real world when I was making my escape all those months ago, I figured it would be the perfect opportunity to expand my chaotic fun. I broke back into the complex to send those messages to the internet critics."

"You sick psychopath," Jimmy frowned, wanting to kick a soccer ball at the screen even though he knew it wouldn't actually aid him and his allies.

"Well, I'm afraid I have to get going," Harrison sighed sarcastically, "The hour of war is dawning, and I don't want to miss any of it. Farewell for now."

The tv monitor then went black, and proceeded to self-destruct.

"What do we do now?" Rabbit asked, "Like he said, you have no evidence on the guy!"

…..

Harrison's protégé was racing up the stairs, trying to escape Starlight Manor.

"I have to get out of here," he told himself, panting. He was resting against a wall when all of a sudden…

"ACK!" he exclaimed, as he felt something pierce his side. It was none other than Judith's horn.

"Can I eat the bad guy?" she asked the others very hopefully.

"You just might, my friend," KW nodded, as the group began to corner him.

"You're gonna tell us everything you know and give every piece of evidence you can provide so we can stop a war," Sly said forcefully.

Backing against a window where a flowing river was below, the masked man knew he had one option.

"No I won't!" he yelled, thrusting his hands towards the detectives, some kind of force knocking them back. The protégé then jumped out the window, landing in the water below and floating away.

"Dang it," Abigail frowned, "He's getting away!"

"We made it," JO panted as the internet critics made it out from downstairs.

"Are you all right?" Double D asked hopefully.

"We're shaken, but otherwise fine," Paw replied.

"Can we do back to the real world now?" the Buster asked.

Twilight and Double D sighed. "With the amount of stress that has been placed on the pods, it will be awhile before we can transfer people through them again."

"Damn it," the Critic sighed, "Is there anything you can do?"

"Well…." Twilight replied.

…..

In the real world, the remaining TGWTG reviewers were prepared to go inside the pods.

"This is it everyone," Linkara said in his Patton-like voice, "We may die, but we will die trying to save our friends!"

All of a sudden, a slip of paper shot out of the pods.

"What's this?" Luke asked, opening the note to read it.

"Dear rest of the site: JO, Nostalgia Chick, Paw, Film Brain, Obscurus Lupa, Blockbuster Buster and I are ok. It'll take some time, but we'll be able to get out of here. Yours truly, the Nostalgia Critic. PS: Mike J, I'm still going to review Baby Geniuses 2 anyways. You don't get reviewers' dibs on it."

"Well, that was pretty random," Marzgurl commented.

"At least we know they're ok, especially Lupa," Todd in the Shadows sighed, relieved.

"Let's go drink Crystal Pepsi!" the Cinema Snob grinned, pumping his fist.

Oanicitizen and the others all happily followed.

…

The critics and the toons were gathered back at the Toon Detective Complex.

Sly had secretly thanked his friends for helping when Carmelita wasn't looking.

"What can we do?" Boober asked, sighing.

"He managed to destroy every record of him we have, and for all the crimes he committed before his capture, he's not that well known so we can't simply inform all the worlds about him," Abigail continued.

Twilight and Rarity, long having been friends, just looked at each other unsure of what would be in their future.

"Pick up your spirits," Paw encouraged.

"Paw's right," Jimmy said, taking charge, "We can't give up now. We may be stuck with a blank slate, but we have to keep fighting. We will track Harrison down, and we will stop this war once and for all. Who's with me?"

"I'm in," Twilight nodded.

"Indeed," Double D volunteered.

"I prefer peace," Mokey smiled.

"You know it," Knuckles and Rouge nodded.

"Oh what the hell," the Critic smiled, the 7 real world people agreeing to help.

…..

Though some loss of life had managed to be prevented, the case is far from over this time. A storm is on the horizon, and everyone must batten down the hatches. But they all know that with a keen eye for details, one truth will prevail…..but they also know that they're running out of time.

The Toon Files…To Be Concluded…..in Season 9, coming in the Summer of 2013.


End file.
